Lewis Gallery at the Portland Public Library, 5 Monument Square, Portland, Maine.

Opening Reception: First Friday Art Walk, March 7, 5-8pm.

The exhibition Collage x 10 is sponsored by CMCA and curated by CMCA curator emeritus Bruce Brown. The idea of collage, or the pasting of paper and other objects on paper, dates back to circa 200 B.C.E. in China with the invention of paper itself. Its popularity as an art form, however, emerged only a century ago, thanks to Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso.

Collage x 10 highlights ten significant Maine artists searching for beauty, not necessarily by rendering recognizable representations but rather by employing the essential vocabulary and tools of art itself –line, light and shadow, color, texture, volume, and space — to express the intrinsic qualities of the world around us by layering various materials one upon the other.