ROCKLAND, ME.- "Goodbye," Andrew Wyeth's last finished painting, will be published for the first time in the 2009 edition of Island Journal, the Island Institute's acclaimed annual magazine of island life. This last tempera, completed in October, 2008, is the highlight of an extraordinary folio of Wyeth's Maine-island work featured in this year's expanded 25th anniversary edition of Island Journal. The folio is accompanied by an essay by Chris Crosman, former director of Rockland's Farnsworth Art Museum.

The 2009 Island Journal will become available on Saturday, May 23rd at a special event held at the Institute's headquarters, 386 Main Street in Rockland from 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. Peter Ralston, executive vice-president of the Island Institute and longtime family friend of the Wyeths, invites all who treasure Andrew Wyeth's work to come enjoy hearty refreshments and raise a glass in tribute to "a man who loved islands." Guests will also enjoy selections from a never-before-seen collection of photographs taken by Ralston of Andrew, Betsy and Jamie Wyeth over a 30-year period. An online gallery of the entire collection will also be available at the Institute's Web site on May 23rd.

Although Wyeth didn't live to see the 25th anniversary of Island Journal, he would have undoubtedly perused it with the same sharp eye as he did the very first issue in 1984, one for which he and Betsy Wyeth provided inspiration and initial funding. The Wyeths were also founding members of the Island Institute, a nonprofit organization that has worked for 26 years in partnership with Maine's year-round island and working-waterfront communities to ensure that they remain vibrant places to live and work.

To learn more about the 2009 Island Journal and the Institute's efforts in the special places that inspired an American icon, please visit www.islandinstitute.org.