Serendipity 

Written by Ira Pearlstein

A couple of months ago, I was browsing the artwork in front of the cash register at BIG!NYC in Gowanus, and spotted a bright, cheerful perhaps Van Gogh-ish painting of arocky ridge trail by the ocean.   The artist's name scrawled in the corner was John Neill.  I turned over the canvas and was amazed to see it was captioned 'the Marginal Way, Ogunquit, Maine, 1977.'  Amazed because I was about to leave Brooklyn in a couple of days to stay in Ogunquit within view of the very same Marginal Way.  I was happy to plunk down my $20 and take the painting home.

Ogunquit was beautiful and warm in the early Fall.  My wife and our two friends and I hiked up to the Marginal Way, a rocky ridge walk along the Atlantic Shore, and found the spot John Neill had painted.   We were a little disappointed to see the backdrop to this pretty spot was now a row of condos, though I guess you could say they're tastefully designed.

Two days later, we visited the Ogunquit Museum of Art, a great place with some wonderful 20th century paintings and sculptures, and a terrific sculpture garden overlooking the crashing waves below.  Lo and behold, in the museum I found a painting of John Neill himself, age about 12, painted by his father Harmon, a well known local artist and full fledged member of what I learned was the Ogunquit Art Colony, which had flourished in the area since the 1890's.  Son John, 'my' painter, hadn't quite the officially recognized 'talent' to attain membership in his father's circle.  In fact, as I learned online, John had spent most of his life in and around Ogunquit, painting the local scene and selling hundreds or maybe thousands of his canvases to tourists from the back of his truck.

I'd also learned by Googling him, that John Neill was injured in a vehicle accident in the early '80's, and  died a few years later, after having had a hard life.   His paintings, bursting with life, are probably scattered around the country in the homes of the tourists who bought them.

In the room at the museum where I saw Harmon's oil painting of son John, age 12, there was also a group portrait, painted in 1961, of the last great generation of Ogunquit Colony painters.  There were about 9 in the painting.  The assistant curator told me the woman on the left - quite a stunning woman -was John's mom and Harmon's wife, and she'd been the object of most of the male artists' active fantasies in her day.  I learned that she's the sole person portrayed who's still alive - late 80's, the curator thought - and that she still comes to volunteer at the museum once a week - usually on Sunday.

I thank BIG!NYC for introducing me to John Neill and his circle, and for enriching my short trip to Ogunquit.