Arts and Culture

PORTLAND, Maine - A medical examiner has been unable to determine the cause of pop artist Robert Indiana's death, but a spokesman says the death was not suspicious.
 
A spokesman told The Associated Press on Friday that the death was likely cardiac-related, but the official cause and manner of death is "undetermined.''
 
Indiana's "LOVE'' series is instantly recognizable around the world.  
 
Indiana died May 19 at age 89 at his Vinalhaven Island home 15 miles off the coast of Maine. His attorney said he died from respiratory failure.
 

A significant painting by the renowned 20th Century painter Jackson Pollock now hangs in the Colby College Museum of Art.

Director Sharon Corwin says the painting, “Composition with Masked Forms,” was purchased last month for an undisclosed sum and hung this morning. Some art historians say the painting highlights a master artist working to develop his own style.

Corwin says she hopes the acquisition inspires curiosity in Mainers and tourists alike.

PORTLAND, Maine - A transgender former middle school student who fought to use the bathroom of her choice in Maine is preparing for her big screen debut.
 
Nicole Maines is starring in the indie horror film "Bit'' as a transgender teen trying to co-exist with and understand a group of feminist vampires in Los Angeles.  
 

Maine tourists or natives on a quest for lobster can find it in countless restaurants, grilled or baked, boiled or sautéed, whipped up into fancy gourmet dishes, or served humbly in the shell, alone on a plate.  But we wondered:  How do the people who catch those lobsters prefer to prepare and eat them?  We headed to the Tenants Harbor Fisherman’s Co-op to find out.  

NEW YORK - Author Tom Wolfe, who chronicled everything from hippies to the space race before turning his sharp eye to fiction, has died. He was 88.
 
Wolfe's agent Lynn Nesbit told The Associated Press that Wolfe died in a New York City hospital. Additional details were not immediately available.
 
The "new journalism'' reporter and novelist insisted that the only way to tell a great story was to go out and report it. His writing style was rife with exclamation points, italics and improbable words.
 

PORTLAND, Maine - A Maine nonprofit is working to restore a historic African-American church building ahead of its 200th anniversary.
 
The Portland Press Herald reports the Abyssinian Meeting House in Portland is the third-oldest church building in the U.S. built by a black congregation. The building dates back to 1828 and it saw visitors such as Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison.