BELFAST — “Glow,” an original oil painting by Belfast artist Jerri Finch, has been selected as the event graphic of Belfast Rotary Club’s 2024 Belfast Harbor Fest. The image will appear on Harbor Fest souvenir items, posters and fliers. It will also be featured in a live auction during “Evening by the Bay,” the Friday, Aug. 16, event that kicks off this year’s three-day Harbor Fest.

“The painting, completed in 2022, is a stunning study of sea, sky and clouds, with a brilliant sun on the horizon. It is painted in shades of blue, orange, yellow and gray, in a flowing style that appears to move with wind and tide,” said Belfast Rotary Club, in a news release.

Jerri Finch, a Belfast resident since 1981, was born and raised in New Jersey. After decades creating multiple-piece corporate commission art works and intricate, technically demanding airbrushed fabric paintings, she delved deeply into the intimacy of oils and smaller canvases. She “paints what is around me.” She now paints only in the autumn, winter and spring, spending as much time on Penobscot Bay as she can.

Trained as a sculptor and visual artist, Jerri studied direct dye technique and fabric manipulation as well as oil painting. Her work is in private, public and corporate collections in Massachusetts, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Vermont, and Hamilton, Bermuda. In Maine, her work can be seen at Maine Public Utilities in Augusta, University of Maine in Orono, Great Eastern Mussel Farm, Belfast and Eastport public schools, Northern Light Hospital Center, and Waldo County General Hospital. Her work has appeared in many publications including Down East, FiberArts and American Craft magazines, and on LandMark Calendars. She has exhibited extensively for more than 30 years, including in New York, Missouri, Kentucky, Georgia and throughout Maine, including at the much-missed Aarhus and ArtFellows Galleries in Belfast. Finch’s work graced the Belfast waterfront at her Finch Gallery until 2019. Her art is now on display at The Hoot in Northport. Her studio is near Belfast and is open by appointment. You can arrange a visit at www.jerrifinch.com.
 
Belfast Rotary Club launches its 17th Belfast Harbor Fest with Evening by the Bay, a special event on Friday evening Aug. 16. Proceeds will benefit the Club’s Centennial Legacy Project, an accessible playground that will be built in City Park in 2025, the year the Club celebrates 100 years of service to Belfast. Evening by the Bay begins at 5:30 p.m. at Belfast businessman Paul Naron’s United Farmer’s Market on Spring Street in Belfast. The evening will include silent and live auctions, the latter with a celebrity auctioneer, plus hors d’oeuvres and live music. Jerri Finch has donated the original of “Glow,” matted, framed and valued at $1,500, for the highest bidder at the live auction to take home.

Rotary Club’s free three-day Belfast Harbor Fest celebrates the city’s maritime history and traditions and continues through the weekend after Friday’s Evening by the Bay event. On Saturday, Aug. 17, the day begins with a 5K road race and blueberry pancake breakfast, and continues with an array of activities for the entire family beginning at 10 a.m. There will be tours of the Front Street Shipyard, a Come Boating! rowing regatta, harbor rows and sails, craft vendors and exhibitors, a Pinewood Derby wooden car race, live music, food trucks and children’s activities. The popular Cardboard Boat Race will take place Sunday morning. For information on the full event schedule, or to be a Belfast Harbor Fest sponsor, go to belfastharborfest.com.

Harbor Fest is one of Belfast Rotary Club’s year round projects. The 70-member Club that meets each Wednesday at noon at the Belfast Shrine Club, is dedicated to community service. Belfast Rotary raises and gives away more than $150,000 annually in scholarships, support for food pantries and kitchens, holiday gifts for more than 200 children from low-income families, donations for special community projects and help for families in need.