Clara Yim Bolduc lives in Central Maine, where she paints, parents, and works as a hospice nurse.

The landscape transforms as the ocean recedes. Salt stains the rocks to a dry and dusty finish. The mudflats smell of decay. Seaweed slips underfoot.

As a child, I loved experiencing the moment of low tide. It felt magical, the rippling water line falling steadily lower and lower, uncovering little shells and slimy treasures, the mud squishing between my toes. And then a tiny pause, the point of transition, the water changed direction, and the entire ocean began to rise and swell. The tide promised, with dizzying certainty, that no matter how still I stood, everything was changing, always.

The raw textures and odors of the uncovered Maine coast contrast with the refined beauty that sits above the high tide mark: the stands of pines and windswept fields that have enchanted generations of painters. Each piece of the landscape feels different to me – the sky, a vibrant watercolor; the mud, an oily impasto; the trees, a loose pencil sketch – and at moments I’m struck by the sensation that I’m living in a poorly planned collage.

This body of work explores various stages of the waning tide, across a range of atmospheric moods. As the water pulls out of view, I attempt to tug at and isolate that which remains, examining the stark contrast of textures and subtle shifts of color that sometimes resonate, and at other times conflict.