NORWAY – Young artist Joanna Reese is following her heart and her dreams in Norway and is having a blast.

“Just because I’m an adult doesn’t mean I can’t acknowledge the child within myself,” said Reese, 25, who plans to dance at her first solo art exhibit, which opens Friday at the Fare Share Commons in Norway.

“It literally will be a celebration of life, absolutely,” she said.

The exhibit of oil, acrylic, watercolor, pen and ink and pastels is playfully titled “Planet Life: The 25th Anniversary Exhibit.” The title honors what she says is “the silver anniversary” of her first 25 years of life.

“I’ve been doing art ever since I could pick up a pencil,” said Reese, who danced with Debi Irons’ local Art Moves Dance Studio from age 8 to 18.

“For me the best thing I do in life is artwork. It’s my goal in life to break the starving artist stereotype,” she said.

The show kicks off with an opening reception at 7 p.m. Friday and runs through April 25. Reese has shown her artwork in shared exhibitions in the area since she was a teenager, and is a member of the Commons Art Collective and the Mountain Poets Society.

“I don’t choose just one medium. I also do photography, sculpture, jewelry and poetry, of course,” she said.

Reese said she’s excited to be a part of the effort Norway and the Oxford Hills is making to place an emphasis on culture and the arts.

“We’ve got this group of artists that are so supportive of one another, and the community seems to be awakening to that,” she said.

Reese works for her family business, a used- and rare-book store in Norway and deals in art and antiques.

At one time she said she considered leaving the state to pursue a career, perhaps as a pediatrician.

Now she’s glad she stayed in Maine, where state planners are busy promoting the economic benefits of a creative economy.

“Ironically, now I realize I’m here for a reason,” Reese said. “I’m glad to be enriching them as much as they’re enriching me.”