The painting tradition is strong in Anne Packard's family from grandfather, Max Bohm, turn of the century Impressionist, to her grandmother, great aunt, uncle, mother, and daughters. Packard studied at Bard College and with Philip Malicoat of Provincetown.

Anne doesn't paint sunshine but likes skies with turbulent clouds. Her paintings have tremendous power, and she portrays the strength of nature in the windswept dunes, the force of the quiet seas, the light striking through the storm clouds, the intensity of night coming across the water. There is a quality in those paintings that draws the viewer in to wonder a little, to contemplate the viewpoint. Packard says that she wants the viewer to see whatever he or she wants to see in them. Brassy, auburn-haired, on the verge of 70, she commands the room with a presence at once theatrical and down to earth.

Anne's process can begin with a place, an incident, or just her imagination. With "Ghost Boat," she says, "I started with a boat. It's unconscious when it all happens; that's the best part. Fortunately, I stopped in time. Cynthia came up to my studio and said `Stop!' " Anne smiles. "I paint for Cynthia's approval," she says. "I've grown tremendously, and she's given me a lot of courage. She taught me to let go. She taught me to believe in myself. Isn't that strange for a daughter to do for a mother?"

Anne took up painting at 30, when the youngest of her five children was 6 months old. At that point, she and her family summered in Provincetown, where her grandfather, painter Max Bohm, had lived toward the end of his life and made his lyrical sea scapes. In the '70s, Anne divorced and moved to Provincetown to live there full time.