BELFAST (AP) – Neil Welliver, a painter famous for his landscapes of the Maine woods near his Lincolnville home, has died. He was 75.

Welliver, who moved to Maine in the 1960s, died Tuesday from complications from pneumonia at the Waldo County General Hospital, said Phil Alexandre, his New York dealer.

“Alongside Andrew Wyeth, he was one of the best-known contemporary artists working in the state,” said Jessica Routhier, assistant curator at the Portland Museum of Art, which is planning an exhibition of his work this fall.

Much of Welliver’s work focused on the woods surrounding his farmhouse, located on the Ducktrap River. Unlike many artists lured by the ocean and rocky coast, he created massive works, sometimes as big as 8 feet by 8 feet, focusing on inland scenes.

“He was very interested in the woods and the thickly foliated landscapes, and all of the different colors and patterns formed by that thick vegetation,” Routhier said.

Welliver was born in Millville, Pa., and attended the Philadelphia Museum College of Art and the Yale School of Art. He founded the Graduate School of Fine Arts at the University of Pennsylvania.

“The way I paint is totally focused and intense and complete. Every mark is a form that’s not going to be covered up later. I don’t go over it. I go down the canvas to the bottom and out, and that’s it,” Welliver once wrote.

The Portland Museum of Art has planned an exhibition entitled, “Neil Welliver: Water and Sky,” from Sept. 3 to Nov. 27, Routhier said.

Welliver’s work has been the subject of exhibitions at institutions including The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art, both in New York, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Welliver was survived by his third wife, Mimi Martin Welliver; three children; and two grandchildren. A memorial service will be held at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Belfast on July 22, which would have been his 76th birthday.