Ogunquit Museum of American Art: History of the Museum

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Reginald Marsh (1898-1954)
On the Boardwalk, Coney Island, 1946
22x30", tempera
OMAA Permanent Collection

History of the Ogunquit Museum of American Art

Visitors often ask how a nationally recognized art museum came to be located in a small coastal fishing village in southern Maine. The answer lies in both the beauty of the area, which lead to the formation of the famous Ogunquit Art Colony in the late 1890’s, and the drive and generosity of the Museum’s founder, Maine painter and philanthropist Henry Strater.

Henry Strater first came to Ogunquit in 1919 to study at Hamilton Easter Field’s Summer School of Graphic Arts. After success as a painter and years in Paris as part of the Lost Generation, he built a permanent home in Ogunquit in 1925. In the early 1950’s he purchased an oceanfront spot that generations of painters had come to know as Narrow Cove, and chose architect Charles S. Worley, Jr. to design a museum.

The OMAA was completed in 1953, and the collection grew rapidly with donations by Strater, John Marin and other artists and collectors.

Images from the OMAA's history (click an image to see it larger):