The Bowdoin College Museum of Art (BCMA) will open "Ann Craven | Painted Time: Moons (Laboratory)" on May 22, 2025, featuring Ann Craven's moon paintings created between 2020 and 2024. The exhibition highlights Craven's direct observation of the moon, with each work documenting the date, time, and place of creation. The show includes a "laboratory" of lunar studies stored in labeled cardboard containers, offering insight into her process. It will be presented in three rotations curated by Anne Collins Goodyear, Jay Sanders, and Adam Weinberg, with about 20 paintings per rotation selected from over 150 compositions. The exhibition runs until August 17, 2025, and is accompanied by a digital catalogue. It coincides with two concurrent solo shows of Craven's work in Maine: at the Farnsworth Art Museum and the Portland Museum of Art.
This exhibition matters because it provides a rare, intimate look at an artist's systematic creative process, revealing how Craven transforms celestial observation into a personal meditation on time, memory, and nature's cycles. The rotating curatorial approach and the inclusion of her "laboratory" offer fresh perspectives on her work, while the concurrent Maine exhibitions underscore Craven's growing regional and national significance. The interview within the article also captures a poignant moment of transition as Craven leaves her Harlem studio of 25 years, linking her artistic evolution to physical space and personal history.