This Thing We Call The Ocean

Sitka’s Iconic Pioneer Bar Hosts First-Ever Art Show: This Thing We Call the Ocean

Sitka, AK — This Thing We Call the Ocean, a new art show by painter and retired Alaskan Salmon Troller, Stephen Lawrie, and curated by Maite Lorente, will debut June 21st at 3pm at the Pioneer Bar and run through July 6th. Hosted by Chris Heim and the Pioneer Bar crew, and sponsored by Roger and Mary Hames and the Sitka Conservation Society, the show is the first of its kind in the iconic bar’s long history. 

Through a deeply personal collection of paintings, Lawrie honors the vital role of a healthy ocean and commercial fishing in Sitka’s culture and economy. Over time, fishermen have become unlikely, yet essential stewards of the ocean—relying on its health and vitality for their own livelihoods. This exhibit honors that evolving relationship, emphasizing the care, knowledge, and responsibility embedded in modern commercial fishing culture. 

The show invites residents and visitors alike to reflect on our relationship with the ocean and to build a stronger community based around our shared dependence on a wild and healthy natural environment and the economic and cultural value it has for our community. In a moment when federal cuts threaten agencies like NOAA that steward our oceans and sustain our fisheries, this show feels both timely and particularly meaningful.

Lawrie’s work was created in part during an artist residency at the Sea Pony Farm, Sitka Conservation Society’s remote creative retreat and field station nestled in the Tongass National Forest in Pelican, Alaska. Thanks to a grant from the Rasmuson Foundation, the former machine shop at Sea Pony Farm was transformed into an off-grid art studio, complete with water, power, and sanitation systems—making this creative work possible in the heart of the wilderness.

More than an art exhibit, This Thing We Call the Ocean is a call to conversation: a space where visitors and locals, artists and anglers, environmentalists and skeptics can find common ground. It’s a reminder that our future—like our past—is shaped by this thing we call the ocean.