Mattapoisett resident and painter Peggy Cooper says her house is so full of paintings from her long career, why not volunteer a few pieces for an exhibit inside the Mattapoisett Public Library?

Since last week, Cooper’s paintings have filled the reading rooms and lobby of the library with landscapes of familiar Mattapoisett sites – the gazebo on Town Beach, the lighthouse, the Clock Tower of Center School and, of course, the Mattapoisett River.

“My house is paintings, from ceiling to floor,” Cooper said. “I thought how much I would like to come to library and see other people’s paintings. Every work is so different so it’s great to see them. It’s encouraging and inviting for other artists to show your works.”

Cooper also lent the library a few paintings by her “inspiration,” her mother and fellow artist, Polly Dunham. It was her mother’s love of artwork that influenced her to pick up the paintbrush. Cooper first worked as a social studies teacher for 16 years in schools across New England, but her love for painting remained a constant pastime, she said.

Though she was born and raised in New Jersey, Cooper and her family moved to Mattapoisett in the 1980s. There, she took up the French style of painting landscapes, “en plein air,” which brings the process of painting from inside to the outdoors.

Cooper said that this style allowed her to take her easel outside and to “seek the truth of the landscape.”

“There’s an excitement to being outside and a challenge,” Cooper said. “It’s a challenge to capture the changing lights, tides, weather conditions, etc. … I have to move quickly to capture the boat that sails away or the egret that flies off. It changes the landscape.”

Cooper’s style is not technical and it’s not perfection. It can best be described as “loose,” she said.

“The sun changes in three minutes when it moves and the clouds move, so you got to move,” she said. “It’s a quick style and it’s a lot of fun. I think with a little teaching about painting and an understanding of shadows and colors, anybody can do that. It’s a lively way to paint.”

Cooper says she would like to return to the classroom, both as an art instructor and a student herself.

“I’m just very happy to be able to do this,” Cooper said. “I just really know that anybody can paint something. It’s something you learn. It’s not something that drops into your life.”

Her work has been featured in art shows across the South Coast. As for future work, Cooper says her latest inspiration comes from the abstract, expressionist work of Russian painter, Wassily Kandinsky.

“Kandinsky is where I’m headed,” she said. “There is no clear picture of anything, so I’m real excited to try that. You know every stroke of a painting so I have to move along and try something different. I’ve done a lot of landscapes. It’s time to try something new.”