A first generation American, Anneli Skaar (born 1969) still holds a strong connection to her ancestral home in Scandinavia. Fluent in Norwegian, she moved to Norway from the San Francisco Bay Area, California, at 18, to attend the National Academy of the Arts (Statens Håndverks-og Kunstindustriskole) in Oslo where she received her BA. After a career of of working as an illustrator and designer, she debuted her work as a painter in 2014, when she had her first solo show ICEHARDSHIPBEAUTY.  

 

Skaar has participated in residencies at Galleri Svalbard at 78 degrees north in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway in 2015; as well as a residency onboard an EIMSKIP container ship traveling from Portland, ME to Reykjavik, Iceland in 2016. She has gathered material for her work in Ilulissat, Greenland, in 2017, at the site of the largest, active glacier in the northern hemisphere and was awarded the Maine Media Workshop’s Book Artist in Residency in 2016 for which she produced the fine art book Bears and Ruins. Skaar has also produced numerous talks and articles related to her work and travels in arctic regions. Her fine press artist books Nansen's Pastport (2020) and The Island Whale (2022) have been published by Two Ponds Press.

She has published the fine press book Monarch under her own mark with a grant from the Maine Arts Commission.

 

 

COLLECTIONS

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Skaar's work is in the permanent collections
of the following museums and libraries

​

Bainbridge Island Museum of Art

Boston Athenaeum 

Bowdoin College

British Library, London, England
Columbia University

Fram Museum, Oslo, Norway 

La Jolla Athenaeum

New Bedford Whaling Museum

New York Public Library
Ogunquit Museum of Art
Peabody Essex Museum

Philadelphia Free Library
Scripps College

Stanford University

Trinity College

UC Santa Barbara

United Nations Library & Archives, Geneva, Switzerland 

United States Library of Congress, Special Collections 

University of Berkeley
University of Connecticut
University of Delaware

University of Miami

Wellesley College

Wesleyan University

Yale University

​

EDUCATION

 

1992, National Academy of Arts, Oslo, Norway, BA Graphic Design/Illustration

 

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

​

2024, Bromer Gallery, Boston, MA

 

2023, Page Gallery, "The Island Whale"

 

2022, Page Gallery, Camden, ME, "Dandelion Life"

 

2021, Trygve Lie Gallery, New York City, "Nansen's Pastport"

 

2017, Jessie Tobias Studio, Camden, ME, "Northern Nocturne"

 

2016, Saltwater Farm, Lincolnville, ME, "Aperitivi"

 

2015, Carver Hill Gallery, Rockland, ME, "Civil Twilight"

 

2014, Heather Hearst LLC, Camden, ME, "ICEHARDSHIPBEAUTY"

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

 

2023, Page Gallery, "Landscapes", July 20

 

2023, Page Gallery, "Still Life", June 15

​

 

 

2022, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, "Boundless"

 

2021, Page Gallery, "Overflow", July 15–August 14

2020, Page Gallery, "Storytelling", September 17–October 11

 

2019, Page Gallery, "Holiday Show"

 

2019, Page Gallery, "Form Follows Function"

 

2019, Page Gallery, "Tideline"

 

2018, Center for Maine Contemporary Art
Biennial, November 2018 - February 2019

 

2018, North Haven Gallery, "Winter Haven"

 

2016, Raugland Gård, Stavern Norway, "The Nerdrum Clan III"

 

2016  Maine Media Workshops, Rockport, ME,
"Exquisite Corpse Fundraiser Exhibition"

 

2015, High Mountain Hall, Camden, ME, "8th Annual Holiday Show"

 

2015, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland, ME  
Art to Collect Now | 38th Annual Art Auction and Exhibition

 

2015, Maine Media Workshops, Rockport, ME,
"Exquisite Corpse Fundraiser Exhibition"

 

2014, Carver Hill Gallery, Rockland, ME,  "Cache Bar"

 

2014, Carver Hill Gallery, Rockland, ME,  "Us and Them"

 

2014, St. Augustine Art Association, St. Augustine, FL,
"5th Annual Nature and Wildlife Exhibition"

 

2014, Las Lagunas Gallery, Las Lagunas, CA, "Art of Dance"

 

RESIDENCIES

 

2019, American Academy of Rome, Italy, Visiting Artist

 

2016, Maine Media Workshops, Book Artist in Residence

 

2016, EIMSKIP, Onboard Residency, Portland, Maine to Reykjavik, Iceland

 

2015, Galleri Svalbard, Longyearbyen, Norway

 

1995, The British School, Rome, Italy, Visiting Artist

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BOOKS

 

Nansen's Pastport, fine press book , Two Ponds Press

 

2019, The Other, self-published book of short stories

 

2016, Bears and Ruins, hand-made artist book, Artist in Residence,
Maine Media Workshops + College

 

2015, Sh*ttiest Coffee at the Top of the World, self-published travelogue