Light
Welcome Words – Véronique Plesch, Professor, Colby College
Welcome to the 2026 summer exhibition of the L.C. Bates Museum, an extraordinary encyclopedic institution focused on the natural world and nestled among the trails and fields of Good Will-Hinckley. Since 2009, I have had the pleasure of supervising two Colby College students in a curatorial practicum to organize the Museum’s annual summer exhibition, and we are proud to mark the seventeenth consecutive year of this enduring partnership. As is the tradition, and in harmony with the Museum’s collections, the exhibition features the work of Maine artists who practice in a diverse range of media and styles and engage with the natural world. For our student curators, this represents a unique, immersive opportunity to experience every facet of organizing an exhibition—from conceptualizing a theme and collaborating with artists, to the final installation within these historic galleries. It remains a privilege to contribute to the true gem that is the L.C. Bates Museum and to celebrate the ongoing vitality of Maine’s artistic community. I am grateful to the Museum and its director, Lyndell Bade, for offering Colby students this transformative experience, and to the Colby College Center for the Arts and Humanities and the Friends of the L.C. Bates Museum for their generous support of the opening reception.
This year’s theme is the occasion for a collaboration with the Maine Arts Journal, the official publication of the Union of Maine Visual Artists (UMVA), whose Summer 2026 issue will also be on the theme of Light. We are delighted to be able to partner again, as we did in 2021 and 2023, with a publication central to the arts in the state of Maine.
Light
Indispensable to life, processed in photosynthesis, and determining cycles such as day and night and the seasons, light is also fundamental to artistic creation. Artists are acutely aware of it, choosing northern exposure for their studios, traveling to destinations famous for their strong Mediterranean sun or diffused foggy conditions, and capturing the specificities of time and season—from the brilliance of midday to the challenge of a starry night sky. Artists and scientists alike are fascinated by light: reflected or refracted, creating highlights and casting shadows, filtering through foliage or dappling the ground.
We can trace the fundamental importance of light through movements such as Impressionism and Luminism, as well as the symbolism attached to it—translating notions of “enlightenment,” “seeing the light,” or “being in the dark.” Given the L.C. Bates Museum’s focus on natural history, this exhibition considers how light defines our experience of the world—from the raw beauty of the natural environment to the ways humans alter the landscape by building campfires, guiding boats with lighthouses, illuminating the night with artificial glow, and celebrating with fireworks.
List of Artists
Exhibition Curators
Winnie Ulland is a member of the class of 2028 at Colby College where she is studying Art History and English. Her interest in curatorial work began in upper school, where she spent afternoons at the Walker Art Center and led The Blake School’s Martha Bennett Gallery, developing an early understanding of exhibition design. At Colby, she works as an editorial intern for the Maine Arts Journal and serves on the Colby College Museum of Art Student Board, engaging with museum programming and writing. Her academic interests center on American art and the role of regional artistic communities in shaping broader cultural narratives. She has also developed an interest in art law and artists’ rights, informing a curatorial practice attentive to the legal and institutional conditions that shape artistic production and circulation. Through this exhibition, Winnie brings these interests together through collaborative work with artists and support for the ecosystems in which their work moves.
Lucy Preston is a member of the class of 2026 at Colby College where she is studying Art History and Government. Her interest in curatorial work began growing up in New York, where time spent at the Metropolitan Museum of Art sparked a lifelong love of art. At Colby, she works as a research assistant to Professor Véronique Plesch and first connected with the L.C. Bates Museum through research there, shaping her interest in exhibition design. Her work explores the intersections of art, politics, and cultural production, particularly how institutions, markets, and state actors shape the circulation of art. Study in Siena and Florence supported her study of European art and transnational visual culture, while professional experience with the Artists’ Collecting Society in London provided art-market training and experience supporting artists’ rights and the circulation of their work. This exhibition reflects her ongoing connection to the L.C. Bates Museum and collaboration with Maine artists.
Professor Véronique Plesch is the James M. Gillespie Professor of Art Professor of Art at Colby College. Born in Argentina and raised in Switzerland, she holds advanced degrees from the University of Geneva in Art History and Medieval French Literature and a Ph.D. in Art History from Princeton University. Her scholarship spans late medieval and Renaissance visual arts and theatre, early modern graffiti, and contemporary art, with a sustained focus on word–image relations. Her work is widely recognized for bridging historical and contemporary fields and for advancing interdisciplinary approaches to visual culture. An influential mentor to student scholars and curators, she has played a central role in shaping Colby’s art historical and museological pedagogy. Plesch is currently on sabbatical. She is an editor of the Maine Arts Journal: UMVA Quarterly, to which she regularly contributes, and has supervised student curators for the L.C. Bates Museum’s summer exhibition since 2009.