Inspiration August Ventimiglia took inspiration for his large wall mural from the Gulf of Maine — its coastal shape, sea life and ocean water data, like wave height, over time. “Those silhouettes of fish are the alewives schooling, and they’re all pointed radially to Portsmouth Harbor, which is the ocean entrance to the Exeter River,” Ventimiglia says. “The great dam on the Exeter River was taken down in 2016 and the alewives started to come back.” Alewife are small fish that migrate between fresh and saltwater.

Execution The 20-foot-long drawing is made with a snap line and a chalk reel, which is used in construction sites to lay a straight line over a long distance. “There’s one person at one side of the string and one person at the other side of the string, and the string is pulled taut,” Ventimiglia says. “Then you pluck it like a string of a big double bass, and  it snaps the line against the wall. … The process of creating it really is a conversation between the two people. The process unfolds over days. I have to trust the other person on the end of the line. It’s like having a dance partner. [Exhibitions and Collections Manager Dustin Schuetz] and I started snapping on Monday. It took maybe 16 hours, just the snapping.”

Contradictions “The idea of using a dry medium to represent a liquid form is one of those contradictions I’m interested in,” Ventimiglia says. “And then playing with the idea of a construction tool to evoke a natural phenomenon is also a contradiction. The contradiction isn’t a bad thing. It’s something to ponder.”