The new exhibition in the Olga Knoepke Memorial Meeting Room at C.H. Booth Library quietly went on view Monday afternoon. Artist and Newtown resident Joe Paccia spent a few hours at the library, hanging 13 large-scale oil paintings and a similarly-sized stained glass work for library visitors to enjoy through the end of May.Joe Paccia's oil paintings and stained glass piece can be viewed any time the library is open, when the lower meeting room is not in use, until May 28. C.H. Booth Library is at 25 Main Street; 203-426-4533 or chboothlibrary.org.Library hours are Monday through Thursday, 9:30 am to 8 pm; Friday, 11 am to 5 pm; Saturday, 9:30 am to 5 pm; and Sunday, noon to 5 pm. To see additional works by Joe Paccia, for additional information, or to contact the artist visit joepaccia.com.(May 4, 2016) Please note, this article has been updated to reflect the correct closing date of the exhibition.

Mr Paccia (his last name is pronounced "pa-chee") has been painting since he was 14 years old, and doesn't seem to want to turn it into a full-time career.

"I haven't really pursued it that much," he said Monday, April 25, of the conscious decision to not worry about public exhibitions of his work.

"I just really love to paint," he continued, while checking on wires and anchors before putting another painting into place. "I paint as much as I can."

He has had shows "here and there," he said, and has sent works out to galleries. He has also worked art into his life in a few facets, however. Mr Paccia is an animator and designer for NBC. He also does carpentry work, he said.

When not doing either of those jobs, he's painting. He has, he said, "hundreds of paintings sitting in my studio.

"I just enjoy being in my studio," he said. That studio is part of the home he and wife Carmen share with their granddaughter, Kiana, and it is Mr Paccia's favorite place to go.

"I'll get up in the morning, about 4 or 5 in the morning, and go into the studio before going to work," he said. During the week he will spend time working on stained glass pieces. Weekends allow more time in the studio, which is when he does much of his painting.

The Paccias have lived in Connecticut for about 20 years, the artist estimates. They have been in Newtown "eight or nine years," he said Monday. "We love it here. We never want to leave."

When they were looking for their Newtown home, Mr Paccia said, one of his requisites was that he would be able to step outside the front door and see a painting. One of the works on view this month, "First Snow II," depicts that coveted view. A vertical landscape, the painting shows a snow-covered collection of trees, a small section of a pond, and just a peek at a setting sun's oranges in a cloudy sky.

While in his 20s, Mr Paccia moved to Los Angeles, where he lived for 12 years. Watching fellow artistic friends set up gallery shows, he decided he would focus on his love of painting solely for that: the love of art, not the business side of it.

"I had a lot of friends that were painters, and they were in the gallery scene," he said. "They spent 80 to 90 percent of their time promoting themselves for galleries, and not much time painting. So I kind of formed my opinion at that time."

For the exhibition at the library this month, Mr Paccia even decided to forgo too much publicity. There will not be an opening nor a closing reception. The artist is just offering his works for the enjoyment of library visitors.

The meeting room at Booth Library is filled with landscapes infused with soft colors. There is a strong sense of calm when looking at Mr Paccia's works, many of which are done to capture sunrise or sunset. Blues and purples permeate most of the linens. All of the works are oil on linen.

"I never got the hang of watercolor," he said. "You can't scrape it off and paint over it," he added, laughing.

All of the works have a strong Impressionist feel, and for good reason.

"Monet is my hero," he declared when asked about his work and inspiration.

"I love the Impressionists," he said. Mr Paccia studied fine arts at Southeastern Massachusetts University, with a major in painting. He dabbled in abstract works while in college, and then landscapes, he said. Earlier styles also included fantasy and portraiture, but he has returned in recent years to his longstanding favorite: landscapes.

According to his biography, Mr Paccia has developed his style "into a neo-impressionism, greatly influenced by Monet, Pissaro and Van Gogh."

Many of the scenes on view will be familiar to those who visit the show. There are paintings depicting sections of Ram Pasture, Ferris Farm, a swampy area off Boggs Hills Road, a duck pond off Poverty Hollow Road, and one of the horse farms along Poverty Hollow. Scenes from Fairfield, Nova Scotia, and Maine have also found they way into the exhibition.

The majority of the works have been done after visiting each painting's location.

"I'll drive around," Mr Paccia said, "until I see something. Or I'll return to something that caught my eye. I like to at least start something on site, and then I can finish it in the studio. Whenever I go anywhere, I always have a camera with me.

"I like to get outside, and feel it," he said of finding a scene.

He also likes to go big with his paintings. "Ram Pasture," found just inside the meeting room on its north wall, measures 78 by 60 inches. The smallest work on view, a New Hampshire landscape, measures 38 by 24 inches.

"That's about as small as I go," he said with a laugh.

So why an exhibition now?

"It's time," Mr Paccia said. "I had put aside doing the gallery shows, probably ten years now. But I feel like now I'm ready. I'm at a point to where I'm pretty solid at what I'm doing."

Lucy Handley, who curates exhibitions for C.H. Booth Library, said this week she was pleasantly surprised to see the collection.

"The work looks fantastic in the meeting room," she said Tuesday afternoon. She was happy, she said, with the large number of Newtown scenes by the Newtown artist.

"He's super at stained glass," she added. "The one piece on view, it's incredible. It's hanging in front of a window. Everyone should stop in and see it."

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