Oct 20

Betsy Wyeth’s reconstruction of the sail loft makes Allen Island especially unique with regard to its spacetime.  In a way the building seems to defy the rules of spacetime altogether.  The original sail loft has rich historical roots in Port Clyde that Betsy Wyeth attempted to maintain in its reconstruction, but can the spacetime of the building truly be preserved?  Much of the design and even boards that make up the sail loft on Allen Island today are the same as the ones that were used to create it in 1822.  So in a physical sense Betsy has preserved much of the historic value of the loft.  However, spacetime relies on the flow of ideas and experiences.  Despite her good intentions and attempt to recreate the sail loft the way it once was, Betsy Wyeth cannot fabricate past memories with this building that would enrich the its spacetime.  Perhaps the spacetime of the building could have been enriched though if David Morey, the man who dismantled the loft because he considered it a “valuable building,”  reassembled it.  Nevertheless the historical significance of the building, whether she experienced it or not, makes the loft all that more valuable to Betsy Wyeth.  Furthermore, I think this adds to the attraction of the museum because of its marine and fisherman themes.  Ultimately she may not be able to preserve the spacetime of the building, but in creating the museum in the reconstructed loft she is establishing a new, historically rich spacetime open to the public.

Maps portray a landscape from an aerial view — and yet they can avoid the meaning and history, or iconography, behind the landscape. Landscapes can come in all different forms; they can be “in paint on canvas, in writing on paper, in earth” etc. In their Iconography and Landscape, Stephen Daniels and Denis Cosgrove said, “Indeed the meanings of verbal, visual and built landscapes have a complex interwoven history”. Well, I believe many maps fail to carry on the portrayal of “interwoven history”.

The map I looked at last week in Colby’s Special Collections room was created by The Atlas of the World. The map was of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island and had a title of something along the lines of ‘Christopher Columbus’s Discovery of the Americas’. The title carries so much weight in regards to the history and meaning behind the landscape that the map is attempting to portray. However, there is nothing else on the map that helps the viewer to understand the iconography behind the true landscape that Columbus stumbled upon and discovered. In fact, the map uses its extra space to advertise the company – The Atlas of the World – rather than inform the viewer of the important material and story behind the map and therefore behind the landscape. I know it is difficult for maps to discuss the iconography of the landscape it is portraying because it is an aerial view with no depth (i.e., no foreground or background). But they should at least use the space around the map to expand on the title and share the symbolic and historical importance behind the landscape that sits within the map.

For Betsy Wyeth, Allen island is, “a 450 acre blank canvas there on the horizon,” explains Peter Ralston, “she (Betsy) had a vision – one as powerful as any ever imagined by any Wyeth. Betsy’s vision was that of resurrection, of reestablishing a community at sea. She envisioned a place where men could base their fishing operations and she saw a home for herself and her husband  – an ultimate refuge.” Betsy also wanted her island projects to be a source of education and betterment of others, as seen in her role in creating the Island Institute in 1983. I think that Betsy’s vision is coming to fruition. Though now she is of very old age, there are many people working hard to make sure Allen Island stays true to how Betsy originally imagined it. In just one visit to the island, it was clear that her goals have been achieved. The hundreds of lobster traps stacked up on the docks mark the the fishermen taking full advantage of their opportunity to use the island. With the creation of the museum, which was mostly Betsy’s doing as well, and the opportunity for groups of students and researchers to visit the island, the island is definitely proving to be a source of education for others. And finally, it is hard to believe that the island is not, “an ultimate refuge,” for Betsy, as after just spending one night there, it feels to me as though it would definitely fit the bill. It is clear that Betsy Wyeth’s vision is being achieved.

Betsy Wyeth’s recreation of the sail loft on Allen gives an anecdotal example of the misconception of culture and place we see in other art forms today. Daniels and Cosgrove describe this redefinition of place: “Our ability to invert signs and symbols, to recycle them in a different context and thus transform their reference. Earlier and less commercial cultures may sustain more stable symbolic codes but every culture weaves its world out of image and symbol” (Daniels 8). The sail loft’s purpose and re-purpose by Betsy and David Morey provides an example of this; a place once defined by retail & manufacturing, and then by a deeply rooted fishing culture could not be erased from place. Betsy’s cultural interpretation of the place attempts to go back to the past using artifacts from the store, or that the lobstermen who lived there once used. Instead, Betsy creates a new sense of place–a clean museum and gallery with organized artifacts. The identity of place from the past is not vivid, instead we see her place today. Betsy creates a learning center crafted with the artist in mind, not a functioning boating store or blue-collar hangout. She looks for objects that define the past, but has created a clean perception of a more rugged industry. Daniels and Cosgrove  identify these intentions, “instead of providing a transparent window to the world, images are now regarded as the sort of sign that presents a deceptive appearance of naturalness and transparence concealing an opaque, distorting, arbitrary mechanism of representation, a process of ideological mystification” (Daniels 7). This same interpretation of the lobstering industry is seen in countless paintings and other pieces of art that represent the local culture. They capture the beauty of lobster boats floating in the water, but the symbolism and the true culture of the lobstering industry have a disconnect. Although tangiential, the disconnect between the local lobstermen and tourists that we’ve discussed is likely due to this symbolic perception. A lobsterman sees the industry and the local area in a much different light than the tourist from out of state would. The tourist has a view of Maine that they have seen portrayed in photos, or in museums like Betsy’s, while the lobsterman views the industry as rugged, working on their engines in the co-ops, or picking up fishing supplies for the days work. By creating a museum, Betsy has attempted to maintain the culture of the local fishing community, but has fell into this deceptive naturalness that so much art does.