MARION — Mary Moquin spends part of the year in a small cottage on a peninsula in Barnstable called Sandy Neck.

She sits and watches the sun. Colors change, and time goes by. Moquin paints images of the dune shacks nearby.

Moquin’s paintings as well as the paintings of Robert Abele are both on display at the Marion Art Center through June 28. The Marion Art Center held an opening reception for the new works exhibited in the gallery Friday, May 24.

Moquin said her paintings are about “what it’s like to just be in the world,” not dealing with all that goes on.

“They’re more about just ideas of being centered and grounded and at peace and stable,” she said.

Abele, a Dartmouth resident, recently earned first place at the Bristol Art Museum’s South Coast Artists exhibit.

Many of his paintings capture the imagery of New England architecture, like that of the triple-decker home. 

He said in an interview with Dartmouth Week he believes he’s able to get people to look a little deeper through his art.

“I love the dialogue it creates between me and the viewer, and I love the stories that they carry,” Abele said.

Moquin said she tends to paint the same house “in different ways,” as the art is about the arrangement of shapes, colors, forms, lights and shadows.

“How they interact in that time — the day that I look at it,” Moquin said. “Watching time pass, how time goes by depending on how the shadows fall. It kind of fascinates me.”