Bringing the Mills Back to Life

The Artists At Salmon Falls Mills Usher in a Collective Cultural Economy

It’s often impossible to trace just how the momentum for a movement started, but in the case of the Salmon Falls Mills in Rollinsford, New Hampshire – just across the river from South Berwick, Maine – the spark for what would become a central arts hub began with a simple request.

“ We never started the renovations with the intention of renting to artists,” remembers Leanne Cutter Pellerin, general manager of Cutter Family Properties that bought the nearly deserted pair of brick mill buildings in 2000. “We had no idea there was such a local demand for studio space.  We actually had an artist approach us with the request that we create an artist studio for her.  Once we started and word got around, the Upper Mill quickly filled with various artisans.”

The Mills at Salmon Falls, www.millartists.com, these many years later remain a hive of cultural activity, with more than 100 artists and artisans, both full-time and hobbyist, established and emerging, working out of 110 studios. A dizzying array of artists that includes painters, performers, jewelers, furniture makers, photographers, fabric artists, woodworkers and craftsmen of every stripe populate the Upper Mill, as do two martial arts studios, a troupe of African drummers and a gregarious group of belly dancers. The Lower Mill houses commercial and light industrial tenants as well as artists, plus the Elysium Arts Folk Club, a café, dance studio and Rollinsford Public Library.

In early May and again in November, Mills artists fling open their doors for Open House events that attract throngs of visitors out to shop, watch a performance, observe a demonstration or talk to a variety of artists.  On just one floor, visitors may watch a glass artist create a one-of-a-kind window pane, admire a wall of paintings created by two artists sharing the studio, marvel at futuristic comic book illustrations peppering a wall in the lobby, take in a photography exhibit or gawk over hand-made clothes.

“For us, the Open House provides positive exposure that allows us to educate the public,” says Ron Tuveson, a gilder (who specializes in a 3,000-year-old technique called water gilding), frame-maker and restorer from Kittery who works out of the Lower Mill with his son, Jared.

At one time, Tuveson operated four separate studios on the fourth floor of the Upper Mill. “The artists were calling me Ronald Trump because of that but what it really meant was that I was walking six to eight miles a day between studio spaces.” A recent move to a spacious, 2,000-square-foot studio in the Lower Mill has meant “more working and less walking” and continued involvement in “a wonderful, creative atmosphere that allows us to get input from other artists.”

Noted painter and teacher, Stan Moeller, of York, (www.stanmoeller.com) sings the praises of the Mills; with the natural light pouring into the studio spaces and the mellifluous sound of the river lead the list. “The whole place has a buzz of creative energy,” he states emphatically, detailing his work routine:  “I love my 600-square-foot studio where I can paint large, stretch canvases, frame my paintings, store my frames and paintings. I have my large art book collection at my disposal. I can get in there in the morning, put on some coffee, turn on my music, an iPod full with 3,000 songs hooked up to my stereo, and paint for hours and hours and just get lost in the process.”

On occasion, he hires the Tuvesons to build custom frames for his paintings, and like them, embraces the experience of being surrounded by other hard-working artists. “I have made good friends with other creative folks. Brad Auger and Dale Vigent at Vigent Custom Finishes make the panels I paint on and Allan Breed made my heirloom quality paint box I use when I paint on location. All have become friends, especially Allan, and his son, Sam.”

The name Allan Breed (www.allanbreed.com) is synonymous with the finest in reproduction period furniture and cabinet making – anywhere. This South Berwick resident, restoration prodigy and famed Furniture Master operates studios and The Breed School at the Mills where students learn the particulars of making American 18^th century furniture  by hand using traditional tools and techniques.

Like most at the Mills, longtime fabric artist Wen Redmond, communicates her regard for the Mills fervently: “There are a variety of people that use the Mills for studios, business and even storage. For me, it can be a gallery, a place to hold workshops, to make art in an atmosphere of a creative community.”

Adds Pellerin: “I think bringing the mills back to life positively impacts the surrounding communities in many ways.  Of course it brings revenue to this area just from having all the extra people eating lunch and whatnot, but I also think it adds character to this area.” 

The Mills at Salmon Falls are owned by Cutter Family Properties (603-749-8879), located on the 4^th floor in the Lower Mill. To find out more about the mills or to make an inquiry about renting, contact leannecutter@comcast.net or (603) 749-8879.

Restored Treasure

 It’s hard to imagine what 18^th century builders, carvers, joiners and other craftsmen would say about the restoration of one of their most magnificent Portsmouth mansions in New Hampshire – the Henry Sherburne House.

Rather than renovating back to one point in time, ambitious restoration plan homeowner, Fred Lowell, enacted – with the assistance of Portsmouth builder, Carl Aichele, and architect, Steven McHenry – a custom approach, honoring not one or two distinct architectural eras, but three.

An historic decorative arts dealer from Hopkinton, New Hampshire, Lowell bought the regal home in the fall of 2002 and began comprehensive restorations the following summer.

He immediately recalls his first and lasting impression of the home: “I liked the architecture of the house; it’s as fine as any house in Portsmouth. We took almost a year to figure out how to do exactly the restoration we wanted.”

Split down the middle, figuratively, from roof to basement, one side reverted back to the mid-1700s, the Georgian period, while the other half  was restored to 1840s Greek Revival era, a period which followed the Georgian and Federal styles. Entirely modern living quarters were installed at the rear of the house in a two-story ell. 

The vision behind the extensive plans forged work and living quarters while paying homage to the home’s important history spanning more than two centuries.

 The well-documented structure is listed on the National Register as a 1725 construction financed by Portsmouth merchant Henry Sherburne, though most architectural historians and preservationists today believe the home was built later in the 1760s as the residence of cabinetmaker, Richard Shortridge. Later, the lofty structure became home to merchant brothers, Samuel and Thomas Rice. Despite disagreement over the exact date of its manufacture, experts agree the home sparkles as a prime example of high-style Georgian architecture.

Lowell’s restoration of the elegant house comes as yet another lucky break for the building. It was saved from the wrecking ball of federal urban development in the late 1960s and carefully removed from a dense swath of tattered, doomed period homes in the North End along the Piscataqua River, to a ‘no demolition zone’ across the street dubbed The Hill. At this juncture, a new basement was added, some remodeling done and the once-palatial residence served as a senior citizen center for many years.

Touring the home in the midst of restoration, Lowell details his thinking behind how each decision was made with respect to dating rooms.

“We tried to capture the way the house evolved – not go to the way it looked when it was built. We went back to the last time the house had something to say, back to the 1840s when the homeowners left some of the rooms to its original, Georgian state and updated others to the latest, Greek Revival style.”

At one point in time, the house was split into a duplex to shelter two families, a fairly common practice in Portsmouth homes, even those with sterling pedigrees. At Sherburne House, Georgian features were left alone on one side and the newer update of Greek Revival elements were added to the other side. This footprint is the template Lowell followed in the main house.

To illustrate his point further, Lowell reveals a section of the foyer wall exposed to reveal three distinct building styles.  “Taking apart the house means mending the facts and discovering things. We took off paneling in the foyer and we can see 18^th century lathe and plaster and over that, Greek Revival lathe and plaster and over that, wallboard from the 1970s when the house was remodeled after its move.”

Completely revived, the Sherburne House encloses living quarters, a workshop, ample storage space and three galleries full of Queen Anne, Chippendale and Federal furnishings and accessories. “The house now boasts two historic periods, but with modern settings,” enthuses Lowell.

The lovingly restored front door surround, with its delicately carved Corinthian capitals, broken scroll or swan’s neck pediment centered with a finial-topped pedestal, announces to all the home’s early Georgian roots. The portal embellishment was removed, and painstakingly restored by Portsmouth master restoration carpenter, John Schnitzler, who took more than 200 hours to pull apart, repair or re-create the numerous pieces. The carved rosettes positioned prominently on the pediment, lost over time, were reproduced – hand-carved – by McHenry.

Past this splendid gateway, a fully resplendent front hall, dated to the Georgian era, opens to a central staircase.

A doorway on each side of the room testifies to both Georgian and Greek Revival aesthetics undertaken over time under one roof. “These two doorways are of different heights; the one on the right has a taller Greek Revival door, the other a shorter Georgian one.”

To the left, beyond the shorter door, a formal living room displays typical Georgian embellishments including pilaster with carved capital window and door treatments, mantel and crown moldings, all original to the house. The room behind it, perhaps another bedroom in the original era, later a kitchen when the house was split in two, is now restored to a Georgian age library.

A central staircase leading to a second floor continues the split of Georgian and Greek Revival floor plans. Above the formal living room, the Georgian style persists in a master bedroom featuring the original floor and fireplace with crown molding. An adjacent room will become a display room for late 18^th and early 19^th century glass and porcelain. “This was probably a second bedroom,” says Lowell.

The formal dining room, off the first floor entry foyer and to the right past the taller doorway, bears all the markers of a Greek Revival room. “Here we tried to create the modern 1840 room where the walls moved in and the windows were made deeper.” Above, on the second floor, a Greek Revival sitting room and bedroom matches rooms below in meticulous detail.

The two-story ell at the rear of the house was built in three sections, explains Lowell. “It began as a lean-to with roof, then changed to a shed with a roof and eventually was enlarged into a two-story addition.”

Here, the floor plan includes a kitchen and sun room on the first floor and a suite of bedrooms with vaulted ceilings on the second floor. An elevator was built in this part of the house to accommodate an elderly member of the household and the efficient movement of Lowell’s antiques. 

The biggest surprise during renovations surfaced on the third floor, in attic space.

Here, on the ‘Georgian side’ of the house, a small finished room with original floor boards featured a small fireplace and was made into a servant’s quarters.

Other remodeling for this uppermost wing converted a room behind the servant’s quarters into a modern bathroom with woodwork matching the servant’s room, and at the rear of the house, a modern bedroom and bathroom. Precise in every detail and fit for its early occupants, the newly minted Sherburne House wears a cap of fresh, wooden shingles. 

Art DiMambro, Further Afield

Standing in his spacious home studio in Durham, flooded with afternoon sunlight, Art DiMambro describes an oil painting in progress, a vista with a prominent grove of olive trees. This rather large canvas, and several smaller ones, chronicle the artist’s blissful five weeks of plein air painting last summer in and around Ascoli Picena, in north central Italy.

The journey, taken with an entourage of students and instructors from UNH as part of an art and language exchange program, took on the sheen of a long overdue homecoming for DiMambro, who was raised in Dover but was born in St. Elia, near Cassino, less than two hours south of Rome.

“I painted a couple of paintings each day,” remarks the bespectacled painter and sculptor, who retired from practice as an orthopedic surgeon in 1991. “They had to be small ones though, because I had to bring them back.”  The verdant surroundings were irresistible: “You can walk out of town to find more views and we rented a car to get further afield. Olive trees and little villages were everywhere.”

A larger painting captures a broad view of Cassino, a beacon of glimmering white atop a hill, ringed by a necklace of smaller villages, including his birthplace. Plein air painting suits the artist well: “It’s a more intense experience than studio painting. The light changes. A lot depends on that first impression. There’s a sense of urgency that certainly lights a fire.”

Discussing a memory or sharing a description about each of his many paintings adorning the walls of every room in his home, DiMambro says he always painted throughout his career as a surgeon, but took classes in sculpture, drawing and painting at UNH post retirement. As a resident doctor in Philadelphia (he earned a pre-med undergrad degree at UNH and his medical degree at UV, Burlington, after a stint in the Army) he was introduced to art shows by a friend who would soon take him to painting classes on Friday nights. “We went to a retrospective of Winslow Homer in New York, and that was it for me, that was the beginning.” DiMambro’s painting style is reminiscent to that of American modernist, Marsden Hartley, 1877 - 1943.

Equally adept at capturing the still life, landscape, his singular still life and landscape hybrid, figurative painting and sculpture, interpreted forcefully in both vibrant and cool color palettes, the artist notes his affinity for sculpture as a by-product of his profession. “Being a surgeon is quite helpful in rendering 3D sculptures as you’re always thinking and moving in three dimensions.”

Several bronzes occupy corners of DiMambro’s living space, mostly nude studies and groups of figures, including bocci ball players and a series of Lake Winnipesaukee swimmers – in reality his four daughters and wife – resting on a sunning platform. Like most enduring artists, his personal collection of art impresses, with works by Arthur Balderacchi, John Laurent, Jane Kaufmann, Gary Haven Smith, Chris Cook and Grant Drumheller, his mentor.

He also has a gift for capturing the fluidity of moving water, no small feat. “As an old trout and salmon fisherman, I do like water,” he states with a generous smile.

Describing a large painting called the Fruit Stand, DiMambro tells of his father’s longtime employment as a rose grower at Elliott Greenhouses, situated in Dover and Madbury. “When that job ended, he had a farm and fruit stand, which I recall here.”

Later, in an upstairs room featuring more paintings of Italian landscapes, the artist speaks to his ancestors and their wrenching decision to leave a slice of paradise: “There are no artists in my family. They were peasants from southern Italy. It’s hard to imagine them leaving such a beautiful place but there was no work. I asked people during my recent trip to Italy if they would leave today and of course they wouldn’t. After World War II the Fiat Factory came into the area and with that came work.” DiMambro plans on another painting trip to Italy later this year with his family.

The artist often paints with Portsmouth based painter Chris Cook; “a lot on Great Bay.” Cook was teaching art at UNH when DiMambro started his practice in 1960, but then left three years later to oversee and teach at the Addison Gallery in Andover, Massachusetts. The pair exhibited together more than once, including a two man show at the UNH Museum of Art in 2001. He has also exhibited at the NH Art Association Robert Lincoln Levy Gallery in Portsmouth; The Currier in Manchester; The George Marshall Store Gallery in York, Maine where he had a one man show and is going to be in a show the first week in June, and the G. Watson Gallery in Deer Isle, Maine.

Fallow

It took me decades to realize that staying still, being quiet , reflective, went against the grain of the now ubiquitous 24/7 ethos demanding constant motion, endless lists of things to do, a ramped up schedule without any free time to lay about.

I clearly remember hearing in middle school that technological advances would surely lead to more leisure time; that the forty hour work week would ebb to half that so we could wander off to sip freely from the cup of rest and recreation.  

So much for that prediction, since every new device seems to only hypnotize us further into loops of constant contact of the digital kind that take us away from actual face time with one another. Cell phones, to me, are one of the biggest scams ever perpetrated on the human race. They often do not ring or work at all. They are easy to break, suffer battery burn out. The minutes restrictions make them beyond ridiculous. No one answers their fucking phone! Everyone has mobile devices but there is less direct communication. One of my least fave experiences is calling someone at a phone number only to hear a message that the caller should reach them at another number, and of course, they won't pick up their phone at this second point of contact either!

All these products do is engender more rounds of messages. A land line always works, doesn’t break nearly as often and you pay a flat fee. But, OMG, if we can’t babble into a device while driving or shopping or walking, we might perish.

Likewise, Twitter is a form of mass hysteria. Like the Borg on Star Trek, we are plugged into a “living network,” in truth a massive mother board maintained by Big Brother, that all-seeing eye and scorekeeper our best writers characterized as a government bully. True, our messages and thoughts and shopping patterns are now in the public domain, but the government didn’t do this to us. We invited all the “convenience” of these instantaneous gratification devices into our lives without hesitation and now we are relentlessly bombarded with adverts. Every time I pull up my emails, there are ads for the shopping sites I visited three days earlier. That is definitely creepy.
We chit chat like gaggles of hyper teenage girls. We hunch over computers, stab at minute keyboards, habitually connect.

My partner recently went to a remote cabin in nowhere Maine, with his friend and his friend’s son. These guests brought their devices, received several phone calls and twittered.  No bubble of solitude, the natural world muted as mere background noise. Even on vacation, we come armed with electronica.

All of this is to say, it’s harder to remove oneself to a less frenetic zone. To feel comfortable in one’s own skin, to stop moving and scheduling long enough to recharge. To lie fallow as a means to invite inspiration, rejuvenation, just as we let plots of garden lie fallow to give the soil a reprieve, to let it come back strong.

It’s quite hard to put down the devices, to turn off the set and the music long enough to simply think and return to some old-fashioned daydreaming, to read, to take a walk. To me, it’s a luxurious lifestyle to be less connected. It makes me take notice of my surroundings, my neighbors, engenders trips to the farmers markets, longer walks and even a few new ideas. Imagine that.

Midsummer Days

In the extremes of weather, we always pine for the other side. In blizzard conditions, we yearn for hot sunshine; in heat waves, we crave Canadian cold fronts.
That is why, for me, the transitional months of the year are best -- April and May, October and November. Temps between 60 and 80 sheer perfection.
Drought has claimed huge swaths of lawn, much of our flower garden has toppled over. The veg garden has survived through regular watering, but in August not much looks fresh.
The smooth, foot carressing lawn is now an uncomfortable stubble on the bare foot. The dragon's blood, a leafy burgundy bush topped with small yellow flowers, which once stood in a huge copse five feet tall, is now a broken bit of biomass dead center in our main garden. The lilles have all passed, leaving dry stalks behind.
These are certainly dog days...which is an insult, really, to our fine canine friends. An insult to their innate loyal characters. Dog days refers to the Dog Star, which follows the constellation Orion through the night sky. In August, this Dog Star (there are really two dog stars following the legendary hunter, as it chases Taurus the Bull) are quite prevalent.
I have mentally banished the dog stars and have set my mind forward to the cool winds of late September, the golden blush of leaves, the first frost. I am of Nordic blood, perhaps even part albino. I must remember to move to Canada!

Natural Selection

Darwin posits that the dna of life on earth mutates, either to the detriment or progression of said life. Some changes usher in a full bloom of population while other mutations fizzle a species entirely out of existence.
I just visited an amazing site: darwintunes.org whereby they apply a mutation formula to create future generations of music, specifically bars of musical notes. What a dazzling way to explain the subtle changes of a mutation, amplified over time, to create unimaginable songbooks.
Here in our garden -- or anyone's garden really -- changes in each growing season provide ample lessons in the myriad factors of success or failure. Last summer, we were awash in strawberries, alledgedly finicky fennel and spiders. The year before yielded bumper crops of shallots, beans, cukes. And always, we grow the most enormous but still succulent butternut squash.
So far, the early celebrities in our patches include the entire herb garden which has assumed a hybrid wild and manicured look the bees will visit well into fall. The lemon balm has hopscotched all over, as has the camomile, but still these greedy growers have left room for the oregano, tarragon, sage and equally bustling bee balm and low growing thymes.
The strawberries are about to burst. Two rows of varying type, both perfect...waiting for more heat before they blush into morsels of intense sweetness.
A white clematis has claimed one of the garden gates, as never before. And the Jane Garden has taken on a whole new look after five years....rife with color and texture only imagined during the darkness of January.
There are always suprises. A lovely rose has moved in with the varigated hosta out front. The hosta holds out its broad leaves, like a welcome lap, under the canopy of the exuberant branch of thorn and bud.
A volunteer narcissus bloomed among our hill of mint, outlasting the group of narcissus in the front spring garden where it really belonged, boldly defying its required light and space requirements. A rose bush my father gave me five years ago when we moved here was placed under the shade of a large maple along the fence and in one of the wettest areas on the property. All quite incorrect growing conditions for a rose. Yet it has tripled in size, throwing dozens of blooms in summer and fall, appearing impervious to any of the many molds, fungi, mites and other maladies.
These stubborn plants bolster any flagging mood the gardener may have. Such as years of tending a perfectly sited shade area for myrtle which grows only marginally, year after year, even with reinforcements. Or the half dozen apple trees that died, introduced into a soil too wet to let them grow, but welcoming to plum and pear trees. All apple trees now go on the barn side of the house! Or the first tree we planted -- an Ohio Pioneer Elm, which did well but is now only leafed on the lower third and is becoming root strangled.
A garden is such a visceral metaphor for the order and chaos, the lovely surprise and disappointment of life. The best bets are always the unexpected, vigorous renegades.

The Full Symphonic Night

Spring brings with it so many charms -- rampant green lawns, gardens, trees in full leaf. To me, one of the biggest changes in my behavior at this time of year, besides long, after dinner walks with the dogs around the creek, is the impulse to linger outside at night, especially before the onslaught of mosquitos.
I've gone on enough camping trips and stirred early enough in my bed to hear the roar of birdsong as the sun rises. It's a cacophany that begs the question: How can anyone possibly sleep past 6 am with this racket going on?
At night, there's certainly a full symphonic blast beaconing, but the songs are different. First, the earth smells different than it does during the day. After dusk, it's impossible not to inhale the growth of plants as they have plowed upward, spurred by hours of eating the light. This intoxicating scent is heightened with a tinge of dampness, a whiff of the bog. The color equivalent would be an emerald green doused with a dusting of chocolate brown.
Standing there, looking into the inky depths of the meadow, an endless night sky freckled with stars, the sounds come. The peepers who began their serenades in March are still in full song, though their volume is now tamped down with hundreds of other sounds.
I can hear the complaint of geese as they settle in amongst the hay of the back field. Little chirps of birds up past their bed times. The wind kicking up waves in the tops of the long grasses. A continuous murmur of birdsong, more like bird mumbles, peeps and calls...Perhaps the comforting salve of birds calming their nestlings? Sometimes, it sounds like a jungle...throaty declarations of toads, coos of doves, a myriad mash up of messages on waves of the lower frequency.
It's an alluring concert. A call of the wild, a reminder of the endless spin of the planet into a new season, flush with growth and procreation.
Like the fleeting blooms of forsythia, the bridal bush, tulips...these nights race by. Later on, the lightning bugs dance above the meadow, the bobolinks talk past sundown, the robins tend to their second broods. The dampness of the earth, drenched in spring showers, is replaced by the sodden summer air.