Events at this location

Join us for MECA&D’s Second Annual Animation & Film Festival, co-presented by Student Life, the Animation and Game & Art Department & Mechanics’ Hall

Featuring original film submissions from Maine College of Art & Design students from across the College and including 2D and 3D animation, experimental live-action, animatics, stop motion animation, video game playthroughs, and more, guests will watch the submissions, participate in live-voting and applaud the award winners!

Films were selected by a curatorial team comprised of Isaac Kestenbaum, Director of the Salt Institute of Documentary Studies, Carly Peruccio, Assistant Director of Joanne Waxman Library, Starr Miller, Assistant Director of Student Life – Student Engagement and Belonging, and Amelia Garretson-Persans, Animation and Game Art Faculty and Film Festival Coordinator.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

Fabiola Méndez is known for her unique blend of genres, including folk, jazz, and Afro-Caribbean influences. Her music takes listeners on a journey through various identities, cultures, and roots.

Fabiola’s mission has always been to share and celebrate the cuatro, folk music, and collective storytelling. In doing so, she’s had the honor of performing at venues such as the NPR Tiny Desk, Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC, Celebrity Series of Boston, New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, among many others.

She has also collaborated with many local and international artists, including the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra, Pedro Capó, Andy Montañez, Danny Rivera, the Chicago Philharmonic, and the Boston Landmarks Orchestra.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

Visiting artist Fabiola Méndez will lead a free community jam session– open to all ages and abilities in our historic membership library.

The idea is an informal, hands-on, and (most importantly) fun environment to learn about Puerto Rican folk rhythms and melodies from Fabiola and her band.

Bring your own instrument, or follow along with your hands.

Free to the public, registration is required.

LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE

Funded in part by the New England States Touring program of the New England Foundation for the Arts, made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts Regional Touring Program and the six New England state arts agencies.

Curated by the Mechanics’ Hall Library Committee, this group reads a mixture of fiction and non-fiction stories that “make knowledge, ideas, and arts accessible.” The salon-style discussions occur on the first Tuesday of every month (November – June) in our charming second-floor library.

The May reading selection is Mad Honey, Jodi Picoult & Jennifer Finney Boylan – A trans girl’s murder and the trial of her boyfriend. Love, identity, and secrets; two narrators. Published 2022.

Learn more about what we’re reading and register here.

The group is free for Mechanics’ Hall Members.

Curious about the group but not a Mechanics’ Hall member? You’re invited to stop by! If you like what you hear, consider becoming a member.

Comfy seating in the library is limited. Please register in advance.

At Mechanics’ Hall, we’re inspired by our founders’ vision to ignite a passion for knowledge, ideas, and the arts within our community. Our Mechanics’ Hall Crafting Group is a vibrant space for creativity and connection.

Whether you’re a knitting enthusiast, an embroidery aficionado, a paper folding master, or simply love sketching, we invite you to share your skills and ideas with fellow makers. Explore the art of textiles, paper, and more, all within the welcoming atmosphere of our library.

Learn more and register here.

Join us every first Wednesday of the month, from September to June, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., for a delightful crafting session. Each meeting will be hosted by a volunteer who shares your love for crafting, ensuring a supportive and fun environment. Bring your materials and let your creativity shine.

Who Can Join?

Our Crafting Group is open to all current members of Mechanics’ Hall. Not a member yet? No worries! Non-members are also warmly welcomed for a suggested donation of $5.00 per session. You can join us for as many—or as few—sessions as you like. Membership at Mechanics’ Hall starts at $50 and is what sustains our programming. We invite you to join here!

Who am I to tell my story? And how can we grant ourselves permission to write the stories we’re compelled to tell when we’ve been told we shouldn’t?

After writing three critically acclaimed memoirs and a decade of teaching memoir workshops at every level, Elissa Altman has helped students face the elephant in every writer’s room: how to craft the stories that are most vital to them despite the voices that have told them not to. Permission is a master course, not only on how to craft memoir, but how to begin and keep going when you’ve been told you can’t, and how to give yourself permission to transcend the fear that keeps vital stories from being written.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

Join us in the historic Mechanics’ Hall Library for a one-time book club facilitated by Gibson Fay-LeBlanc, the Executive Director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance.

Whether you’re familiar with Kaminsky’s work or new to his poetry, this event offers a unique opportunity to reflect on art and silence as tools of resistance and the power of human connection in difficult times. Come for the poetry, stay for the conversation.

Complimentary copies of the book can be picked up at Mechanics’ Hall and SPACE Gallery.

Tea and snacks will be provided. This event is free and open to the public. Space is limited so please register in advance.

REGISTER HERE

SPACE Gallery & Mechanics’ Hall are hosting collaborative programming, reading groups, and workshops around Ilya Kaminsky’s book of poems Deaf Republic. This series explores themes of community loss, accessibility, silence as resistance, love in the face of violence and war, and artists exploring deafness and tinnitus.

Mechanics’ Hall and PRINT: A Bookstore team up to present a conversation between New Yorker regular, Harry Bliss and local cartoonist Caite McNeil.

YOU CAN NEVER DIE is a graphic memoir from Harry Bliss, renowned New Yorker cartoonist, and eight-time New York Times bestselling illustrator (most recently for the bestsellers A Wealth of Pigeons and Number One is Walking, illustrated alongside Steve Martin).

In his first memoir, Bliss delves into his childhood, family life, and coveted career as a New Yorker cover artist. He tells his story through cartoons and prose essays about the loss of his beloved dog, Penny (who has been featured in his New Yorker cartoons for years), and the people and animals who have shaped the course of his life — including his immediate family, friends, and artists Maurice Sendak, Andrew Wyeth, Ed Koren, Steve Martin, James Gandolni and many more.

You Can Never Die is an ode to both a treasured canine companion and the author’s past, featuring never-before-seen sketches from Bliss’ career. It is vulnerable, funny, sad, and hopeful in the most beautiful way.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

Join hosts Marco Soulo and Signature MiMi for an evening where all artists and makers are welcome to share their creations and be in community with other poets, musicians, artists, crafters, and thinkers.

Monthly on the 3rd Wednesday of the Month!

Mechanics’ Hall and Back Cove Books welcome authors Lynn Steger Strong and Rebecca Traister for a conversation, centering around Steger Strong’s latest book, The Float Test.

Lynn Steger Strong is the critically acclaimed author of Flight, a sophisticated and layered novel about sisters, betrayal, love, and climate change. The Float Test is for readers of The Dutch House and The Most Fun We Ever Had.

The event begins at 6:00 PM (doors 5:30 PM), the event will be approximately 75-minutes, followed by a Q&A.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

little house is proud to restage two feminist dance performances, presented by Mechanics’ Hall.

they have taken nothing (2017) explores the space between giving in and holding on. Three dancers seize pieces of each other, creating tension and submission through charged moments of contact and release. they have taken nothing is a deeply feminine work that comments on our ability to withstand something in order to take what we need.

to quiet the marks II (2023) considers how Western healthcare systems require women and individuals with vulvas to absorb and dismiss physical trauma within a medical context. The work takes its influence from the contrast between the stark coldness and inherent violence of gynecological procedures and the warmth, sensitivity, and tenderness of human flesh. The performance of to quiet the marks II explores states of effort, control, and relief as a way of excavating layers of medical trauma in order to reclaim ownership of the body.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

little house is proud to restage two feminist dance performances, presented by Mechanics’ Hall.

they have taken nothing (2017) explores the space between giving in and holding on. Three dancers seize pieces of each other, creating tension and submission through charged moments of contact and release. they have taken nothing is a deeply feminine work that comments on our ability to withstand something in order to take what we need.

to quiet the marks II (2023) considers how Western healthcare systems require women and individuals with vulvas to absorb and dismiss physical trauma within a medical context. The work takes its influence from the contrast between the stark coldness and inherent violence of gynecological procedures and the warmth, sensitivity, and tenderness of human flesh. The performance of to quiet the marks II explores states of effort, control, and relief as a way of excavating layers of medical trauma in order to reclaim ownership of the body.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

little house dance‘s 5th Creation Lab will take place over a two week period, for the very first time!

Participants can choose to do one week or both. In both weeks, you will learn about their working methodologies and experience their creative process and studio environment. Creation Lab is led by director Heather Stewart alongside other collaborators and dancers. Creation lab takes place in the historic Maine Mechanics’ Hall Ballroom.

REGISTER & LEARN MORE HERE

Week One: Repertoire & Restaging |  June 3rd – 7th

Week Two: Deep Dive into Creation & Process| June 10th – 14th

Curated by the Mechanics’ Hall Library Committee, this group reads a mixture of fiction and non-fiction stories that “make knowledge, ideas, and arts accessible.” The salon-style discussions occur on the first Tuesday of every month (November – June) in our charming second-floor library.

The June reading selection is A Map of Future Ruins by Lauren Markham – A mesmerizing, trailblazing synthesis of reporting, history, and memoir. The stories we tell about migration don’t just explain what happened but what will happen. Published 2024.

Learn more about what we’re reading and register here.

The group is free for Mechanics’ Hall Members.

Curious about the group but not a Mechanics’ Hall member? You’re invited to stop by! If you like what you hear, consider becoming a member.

Comfy seating in the library is limited. Please register in advance.

At Mechanics’ Hall, we’re inspired by our founders’ vision to ignite a passion for knowledge, ideas, and the arts within our community. Our Mechanics’ Hall Crafting Group is a vibrant space for creativity and connection.

Whether you’re a knitting enthusiast, an embroidery aficionado, a paper folding master, or simply love sketching, we invite you to share your skills and ideas with fellow makers. Explore the art of textiles, paper, and more, all within the welcoming atmosphere of our library.

Learn more and register here.

Join us every first Wednesday of the month, from September to June, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., for a delightful crafting session. Each meeting will be hosted by a volunteer who shares your love for crafting, ensuring a supportive and fun environment. Bring your materials and let your creativity shine.

Who Can Join?

Our Crafting Group is open to all current members of Mechanics’ Hall. Not a member yet? No worries! Non-members are also warmly welcomed for a suggested donation of $5.00 per session. You can join us for as many—or as few—sessions as you like. Membership at Mechanics’ Hall starts at $50 and is what sustains our programming. We invite you to join here!

Maine Writer’s & Publishers Alliance, Mechanics’ Hall, and Longfellow Books present a conversation with Paul Lisicky and Michael Colbert, reflecting on Paul’s latest book Songs So Wild and Blue.

From the moment Paul Lisicky heard Joni Mitchell while growing up in New Jersey, he recognized she was that rarity among musicians–a talent whose combination of introspection, liberation, and deep musicality set her apart from any other artist of the time. As a young man, Paul was a budding songwriter who took his cues from Mitchell’s mysteries and idiosyncrasies. But as he matured, he set his guitar aside and lost himself in prose, a practice that would eventually take him to the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and into the professional world of letters.

LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE

As the decades passed, Paul’s connection to Mitchell’s artistry only deepened. Joni’s music was a constant, a guide to life and an artist’s manual in one. As Paul navigated love and heartbreak and imaginative struggles and the vicissitudes of a creative career, he would return again and again to the lessons found in Joni’s songs, to the solace and challenges that only her musicianship could give.

Song So Wild and Blue is a gorgeously written, beautifully intimate, and unique tribute to the woman whose artistry shaped generations of creators and thinkers. Lisicky offers his own coming-of-adulthood as testimony to the power of songwriting and staying true to your creative vision. A guide to life that is part memoir, part biography, and part homage, Song So Wild and Blue is a joy for devoted Joni enthusiasts, budding writers, and artists of all stripes.

Wednesday, June 4 at 6:00 PM (Doors 5:30 PM), approximately 60 minutes, followed by a Q&A and book signing.

Join us for a compelling book talk with Sharon Kitchens, author of The Murder of Dorothy Milliken: Cold Case in Maine, and Dorothy’s daughter, Tonia, for a discussion on this tragic true crime story. Sharon will speak to why she chose this story and how she approached it— combing through old newspapers, digital sleuthing, and conducting revealing interviews. Sharon and Tonia will discuss the challenges of investigating cold cases in Maine. They will also address the emotional toll and the importance of centering on victims’ stories with respect and integrity. The event will be moderated by Kristen Seavey, the creator and host of the Murder, She Told podcast.

Thursday, June 5 at 6:00 PM (doors 5:30 PM), approximately 75 minutes, followed by a Q&A. This event is presented by Greenhand Books and Mechanics’ Hall.

LEARN MORE & GET TICKETS HERE

Start your day with a morning figure drawing session in the sunlit grand ballroom of Mechanics’ Hall. This session will feature fresh florals amongst the models.

Enjoy live music while savoring [free] tea, coffee, and snacks. Bring your materials, or borrow from our supplies.

Whether you’re a seasoned artist or a beginner, embrace the joy of drawing a live model in a vibrant community. All are welcome.

Tickets are on a sliding scale, please pay what you can afford.

The drawing session begins at 11:00 AM, and doors open at 10:45 AM.

LEARN MORE AND REGISTER HERE

little house dance‘s 5th Creation Lab will take place over a two week period, for the very first time!

Participants can choose to do one week or both. In both weeks, you will learn about their working methodologies and experience their creative process and studio environment. Creation Lab is led by director Heather Stewart alongside other collaborators and dancers. Creation lab takes place in the historic Maine Mechanics’ Hall Ballroom.

REGISTER & LEARN MORE HERE

Week One: Repertoire & Restaging |  June 3rd – 7th

Week Two: Deep Dive into Creation & Process| June 10th – 14th

Mechanics’ Hall & Back Cove Books present a conversation centered on janan alexandra’s debut poetry collection

In her debut poetry collection, COME FROM, janan alexandra weaves from English into Arabic, exploring the joint projects of longing and belonging. Part love song for the speaker’s mother, part grief song for ongoing postcolonial loss, this book reaches for, around, underneath, and through language—feeling for its limits and possibilities.

Drawing on both narrative and lyric impulses, alexandra invites readers into a world bristling with family, memory, home, and inheritance—all in the wake of dislocation and fracture. In one section of the book, we follow the speaker “back home” after years of separation; later, we encounter a series of parables in the form of an Arabic abecedarian, through which the speaker recovers parts of her mother tongue. Here, alexandra probes the gifts and wounds of language, invoking personal and communal histories marked with the longue durée of empire.

LEARN MORE AND GET TICKETS HERE

Join us for a public staged reading of Ilya Kaminsky’s 2017 book of poems, Deaf Republic, with a post-show talkback. ASL interpretation will be provided.

LEARN MORE AND REGISTER HERE

SPACE Gallery & Mechanics’ Hall have teamed up for the NEA Big Read. The two venues are hosting collaborative programming, reading groups, and workshops around Ilya Kaminsky’s book of poems Deaf Republic. This series explores themes of community loss, accessibility, silence as resistance, love in the face of violence and war, and artists exploring deafness and tinnitus.

The reading is approximately 60 minutes.

This event is part of the BIG READ series, presented by SPACE Gallery and Mechanics’ Hall.

NEA Big Read is a program of the National Endowment of the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest.

Join hosts Marco Soulo and Signature MiMi for an evening where all artists and makers are welcome to share their creations and be in community with other poets, musicians, artists, crafters, and thinkers.

Monthly on the 3rd Wednesday of the Month!

The most anticipated event of the season! We’re returning to where it all began in 2015, Mechanics Hall, the original venue of Portland is Burning — the first vogue ball in Portland, Maine.

In celebration of Black Pride, Vogue Ballroom, and QTBIPOC artistry, Aquarius Funkk is joined by the Duchess of Casco Bay herself, Chartreuse Money, to host the most anticipated event of the season! Show up and show out, radiate in your truest colors, and bring your brightest light to the runway.

LEARN MORE AND GET TICKETS HERE

Join Mechanics’ Hall and Print: A Bookstore in presenting entrepreneur, author and body acceptance advocate Katie Sturino for the release of her debut novel, Sunny Side Up.

From body acceptance advocate and MEGABABE founder Katie Sturino comes a heartwarming and hilarious debut novel.

LEARN MORE & REGISTER HERE

Sunny Greene is thirty-five, recently divorced, and about to have a meltdown in the Bergdorf Goodman swimsuit department dressing room. But isn’t rock bottom the perfect place to start a climb?

She decides it’s now or never. Sunny has her PR empire, her gorgeous Chelsea apartment, her two dogs, and her loyal best friends. She decides it’s time to love her body and accept herself for who she is, and with this new confidence, her journey begins. Who says a plus-sized divorcee can’t put herself first, feel beautiful, and date up a storm?

Is fate knocking at her door with Dennis, the charming and down-to-earth mailman, or should she be with Ted, the business tycoon who seems ready to make her size-inclusive swimsuit brand a reality? And what should she do about her ex, who shows up unexpectedly, eager to reconnect?

With the same candor and confidence her followers love, Sturino brings us Sunny Greene, a Carrie Bradshaw for the next generation, and her tribute to the trials and triumphs of dating, friendship, and finding yourself.