that space between flying & falling x freedom of spirit x maybe partying will help
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Oh, this ol’ thing?..
*****FERTILE SOLITUDE*****
WHEN: On view through December 18, 2016
WHERE: Mills Gallery at Boston Center for the Arts, 539 Tremont St, Boston, MA 02116
HOW: OFFICIAL WEBSITE
PARTICIPATING ARTISTS: Piper Brett, Caleb Cole, Emily Eveleth, Dana Filibert, Cig Harvey, Kyle Hittmeier, Annette Lemieux, Megan and Murray McMillan, Noritaka Minami, Hao Ni, Steven Pestana, Shelley Reed, Erin M. Riley and Sarah Wentworth
WHAT/WHY: “In the rush of everyday life, we occasionally need to hit pause (and reset), but even a moment’s peace can be hard to come by. This frenzy is often furthered by our mutually enabling relationship with technology and a self-inflicted state of constant connectivity. Unwilling to put down our phones to see a sunset, sharing our daily comings and goings with the ghosts in the machine, we self-sabotage our peaceful pursuits and further separate ourselves from ourselves.
Fertile Solitude hopes to offer a reprieve from the madding crowd, an oasis that coaxes us to look inward and take steps towards overcoming our widespread aversion to introspection.
Within the physical framework of a maze, exhibition visitors are left to go their own ways. Their journeys will take them through the works of 15 artists whose histories and visual languages tell their own stories. The exhibition has no singular origin. Rather, its narrative is a compilation of external observations of human behavior, the curator’s ongoing personal quest to achieve homeostasis, the notebooks of French philosopher Albert Camus, the musings of British psychoanalytical writer Adam Phillips, and even a recent study finding that, to an overwhelming degree, people would rather shock themselves with an electrical current than sit in quiet contemplation for even 15 minutes.
With an emphasis on the individual, Fertile Solitude presents art in an unexpected environment that encourages wanderlust, rewards curiosity and contemplates the restorative properties of simply being alone with your own thoughts.”
/shamelessselfpromotion
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Koichiro Kurita: Freedom Of Spirit, Harmony With Nature
When: On view November 5 through December 10, 2016
Opening Reception: Sunday November 6, 2-5PM
Where: 555 Gallery, 555 East 2nd Street, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Through the upcoming exhibition of his stunning platinum photographs discover the photographer’s profound reverence for harmony with nature and his fascination with the writing and philosophy of Henry David Thoreau.”
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Altering the City: Video Landscape: Traces of Wind and Water
A video installation by Georgie Friedman
When: On view through November 14, 2016(Nightly, Dusk to 11pm)
Artist Hours: Sunday, November 6, 5 – 6:30 pm
Where: Outside Strand Theater( on the upper, brick, south-facing wall)m 543 Columbia Rd, Dorchester, MA 02125 (Best seen near 531 Columbia Rd & Hancock St, Dorchester, MA 02125)
What/Why: “This video installation is made up of three sections: one section visually replants large trees on the site, their swaying tops visible from the street below; another transforms the Strand into an architectural/natural waterfall with a constant flow; and in the third, wild grasses spring up and dance in the wind.”
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Steve Locke: School of Love & Family Pictures
When: On view through November 26, 2016
Opening Reception: November 4th, 5-8PM
Where: Samson Projects + Gallery Kayafas, 450 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA (both galleries)
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Samsøñ, in collaboration with Gallery Kayafas, presents an exhibition by Steve Locke in two parts: The School of Love debuts new painting, sculpture, and installation; and Family Pictures the artist’s first photographic portfolio printed by Palm Press.
Locke’s third solo presentation at Samsøñ, The School of Love is inspired by Correggio’s painting of the same name. That enigmatic painting, which posits a relationship between love, sex, and communication, caused the artist to begin an exploration into the ways he learned about love. The work delves into how the artist learned about different kinds of love.
Titles communicate ideas of what the artist was taught about his self by the culture, (“lesson from Occupied Japan), by intimate partners (“for when he tells you, “I love your nigger cock”) and the different teachers he has encountered (“the altruist”, “the apologist”). The latter works are painted in a dense white palette that skirts traditional notions of flesh. Locke has taken on the criticism of painting “white people” as a challenge.
The artist has married this autobiographical impulse to his aesthetic toolkit of painting by bringing a cast head of a faun into the work (a kitsch object that bears a striking resemblance to the artist himself). This doppelgänger has been cast in Hydrocal and colored through a dyeing process that is controlled, but allows for serendipity to play a part in the results. Nails penetrate some of the heads and cotton rope and are used to bind and connect the works to each other. The allusions to function (both violent and religious) and history contained in these loaded materials adds a level of urgency that speaks directly to the current moment in culture.
These heads hang and stand in relation to and in conjunction with the artist’s signature portrait heads and free-standing paintings, some of which penetrate the floor of the gallery. The artist has shifted the palette to focus on the whiteness of the characters in the work.
Family Pictures at Gallery Kayafas
What/Why: “Technologies have begun to bring the state sponsored violence meted out to black people to a larger consciousness.
This violence has been long known to black and poor people, but it is now present to the dominant culture.
Today, you can show black people being shot to death on television.
The dominant culture experiences this phenomenon as something “New.” They refuse to believe that what they are experiencing is the exact way things have always been done. They want to believe that it is an anomaly. This requires the dominant culture to deny that the basis of America’s relationship to black people is violence. It has always been violence placed in the service of a domestic identity.
I chose to make work that marries contemporary and historical violence to the domestic impulse.
Publicly created and shared photographs of violence against black people now inhabit contemporary frames. Using frames designed for keepsakes or familial milestones, siting these on a 1960s era Andre Bus coffee table against various hues, the work reconciles a violent history with the contemporary spectacle of state violence within a domestic sphere.
These are the Family Pictures we have long pretended do not exist.”
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Waltham Mills Open Studios
When: November 5th + 6th, 2016 12:00-6:00PM
Where: Waltham, MA | List of participating artists here
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Waltham Mills Open Studios includes 3 great groups of artists within 2 blocks of each other.
Waltham Mills Artists’ Association is one of Greater Boston’s oldest artists’ communities, with more than 80 artists working in a wide range of media.
Lincoln Studios at 289 Moody Street, houses more than a dozen artists.
In addition, 10 artists from Metalwerx, a jewelry school and community studio nearby, will also be showcasing jewelry and metal art on the first floor of 144 Moody St.”
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Robert Freeman -New Works
When: November 4 – December 18, 2016
Opening: Friday, November 4, 6- 8 PM
What/Why: “The African American community is as complex as any other. It has no single voice, no single way of seeing the world, and no single way of producing art, music, literature or theater. My paintings explore and celebrate the beauty, elegance and grace of the black middle class through my personal experience.
Commissioned for an exhibition at Adelson Galleries Boston, New Works is inspired by my childhood spent between two cultures: the Gold Coast, West Africa (now Ghana) and the East Coast of the United States. In New Works I revisit the themes of race and culture that I explored in “Black Tie” (1981), part of a series that comments on the personal conflict I felt as African-Americans settled into middle-class life following the racial tensions of the 1960s and 1970s. Although much has changed in 35 years— including the election of the nation’s first African American President— questions of identity and inclusion remain.
New Works includes eight oil paintings of African Americans at formal social events. The figures in my latest series are more engaging and the colors more intense than in my previous work.”
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Frances Jakubek, Carefully Omitted: Left Behind
When: On view through November 19, 2016
Where: Dorchester Art Project, 1486 Dorchester Ave #2, Boston MA, 02122
How: Official Website
What/Why: “The Dorchester Art Project is pleased to present Left Behind, an exhibition of painting, printmaking and photography that explores the physical and emotional detritus that remains when artists subtract.
Rachel Loischild’s haunting color photographs documents the aftermath of weather, showing stillness that follows the momentum of trauma enacted on the land. Likewise, Chris Maliga works within the natural world to create ethereal self-portraits. His figure is ghosted within trees and rivers, marking the film with the traces of his physical movements.
Paintings by Sarah Meyers Brent subtract as much as they add, questioning the traditional process of building paintings from on top a stable ground. Earthy textures and tones are revealed when paint is scraped away, suggesting a corollary with plants that grow and diminish in accordance with the seasons. Reductive prints byDeborah Sosower also reference the absent as much as what remains: graphic representations speak to the creation and destruction of the landscape and the self. Further exploring the construction of identity and narrative, Frances Jakubek’s photographed collages stitch pieces of the past into new realities, implying stories that cannot be resolved.
The tenuous connections between pieces reveal the nuances of process and concept. Visual resonances of the forgotten and left behind resonate through explorations of the landscape and our places within it, creating dialogue about our presence and absence within the world.
Artists: Sarah Meyers Brent, Frances Jakubek, Rachel Loischild, Chris Maliga, Deborah Sosower”
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Gerry Bergstein : Skeleton Crew
When: On view through November 5, 2016
Where: Gallery NAGA, 67 Newbury Street, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: In October, Gallery NAGA presents Gerry Bergstein’s new paintings, which look like though they’ve been buried in art history’s tomb, subsequently unearthed – until Bergstein came along to salvage and make sense of it all.
Gerry Bergstein: Skeleton Crew runs from October 7 through November 5. A reception for the artist and the public will be held at the gallery on Friday, October 7 from 6 to 8 pm.
This exhibition is accompanied by a fully illustrated catalog with a transcribed conversation between Gerry Bergstein and two fellow artist friends of his, Sheila Gallagher and Ethan Murrow. What follows are excerpts from this discussion.”
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Colleen Kiely – 800 Million Heatbeats
When: On view through November 9, 2016
Where: Simmons College, The Trustman Gallery, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Simmons College presents 800 Million Heartbeats, a solo exhibition by figurative painter Colleen Kiely, from October 11 – November 9, 2016 at the Trustman Art Gallery located on the fourth floor, Main College Building, 300 The Fenway in Boston. The title of the exhibition references the concept that all mammals have a total of 800 million heartbeats in their lifetime, sharing the same approximate mortality. A reception for the artist will be held on Thursday, October 20 from 5-7 P.M. The exhibit and reception are free and open to the public
The transitory nature of time and memory and the inevitability of loss are the conceptual foundation of Colleen Kiely’s recent work, which focuses on the artist’s aging basset hound Beau as model and avatar. Kiely is an inventive painter whose imagery is deceptively familiar, but on further inspection is unsettling in meaning and narrative. Kiely’s paintings are formally and materially challenging, but her forte lies in how she makes us feel. She nudges us towards something more – a realization of time’s passage – through joy, sorrow and comprehension of our own transience. In the western tradition, vanitas artworks depict ordinary objects that symbolically remind us that the nature of life is death. Kiely’s depictions of her now deceased canine companion Beau touch us with their bittersweet sensibility. The paint handling is expressively fluid, connecting figure and ground, image and surface. Contrasting transparencies with moments of definition, these paintings are not a frozen snapshot of a time or place but rather a continuum of experience for the painter, the subject, and finally, our complicit acknowledgement as viewers.”
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Start With a Triangle
When: On view through November 22, 2016
Where: Buckingham Browne and Nichols Upper School Gallery, 80 Gerry’s Landing Road, Cambridge, MA
How: Official Website
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Joe Wardwell: Maybe Partying Will Help
When: On view through November 11, 2016
Where: LaMontagne Gallery, 540 Main Street, Winchester, Ma 0189
How: Official Website
What/Why: “”Maybe Partying Will Help” New Paintings By Joe Wardwell at LaMontagne Gallery”
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Eric Sealine | Seven Studios: A Memoir | Dennis Svoronos | Grey Matters
When: On view through November 13, 2016
Where: Boston Sculptors Gallery, 486 Harrison Avenue, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why: Learn more about the exhibitions here
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Patty Adams: Poet’s Walk
When: On view Nov 2- 27, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday, November 4 6-830 pm
Where: Bromfield Gallery, 450 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA, 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why: “The imagery in Patty Adams’ latest work emerged from repeated excursions in 2015 to a piece of parkland in Rhinebeck, NY, called “Poet’s Walk.”
During these visits, Adams made drawings in ink and charcoal, and she tried to find a connection between the marks of the drawings and her feelings experiencing this landscape.
Later in her studio she found that adding color to the black and white drawings got closer to describing these emotions.”
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Raúl Gonzalez: Forbidden Frontera
When: November 2 – December 21, 2016
Reception: November 4, 5:30-7:30
Where: Carroll and Sons Gallery, 450 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
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Elbow Room | Neon Network | Exercises for the Quiet Eye
When: On view November 2nd through November 27th, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday November 4th, 5-8PM
Where: Kingston Gallery, 450 Harrison Ave, No. 43, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why: Learn more about the exhibitions here.
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Niho Kozuru
When: On view through November 15, 2016
Where: Miller Yezerski Gallery, 460 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA, 02118
How: Official Website
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Meredyth Hyatt Moses: An Eclectic View
When: On view through November 27, 2016
Where: Abigail Ogilvy Gallery, 460 Harrison Ave, C7, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why:“Abigail Ogilvy Gallery is proud to present An Eclectic View, a group exhibition guest curated by Meredyth Hyatt Moses, independent curator and former owner and director of Clark Gallery, involved in the Boston art scene since the 1970’s. Guided by her refined and experienced taste, Moses selects pieces by local artists, which are both aesthetically distinct and cohesive. The resulting collection attests to the quality and diversity of fine art in Boston.
Moses’ curatorial vision has no bounds. In her nearly 30 years at Clark Gallery, she exhibited every medium from furniture and glass to painting and sculpture. She showed one of the first prominent clay sculpture exhibitions in Boston, and often featured international and outsider artists. An Eclectic View follows the tradition of her December Salon Shows—one she spent all year curating from diverse artists and techniques. Her criteria are simple and direct: quality, interest, and an understanding of medium.
An Eclectic View demonstrates the spirit of discovery that is alive in Boston arts, showing a range of work that is tied together by skill and uniqueness, brought together by Moses’ lifetime of passion for fine art.”
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Richard Artschwager: Books, Punctuation, Splats & Time
When: On view through December 3, 2016
Where: Barbara Krakow Gallery, 10 Newbury Street, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “The work of Richard Artschwager does not take to labels easily, as it incorporates and/or quotes elements of Conceptualism, Minimalism, Pop, Photorealism and Surrealism, among others. In a partial homage to Artschwager’s singular, yet quotation-filled approach, we have compiled a series of statements by the artist and by others that relate both to the specific works on display in this exhibition as well as to his general approach.
PUNCTUATION MARKS
Adam Weinberg, director of the Whitney Museum of American art, in describing Richard Artschwager’s punctuation marks, wrote that, “they appear as humorous, sensuous forms — yet mute ones, detached from the dramatic feeling or sound that they would imply in a text. Decontextualizing the emotion associated with the mark contradictorily summons an existential loneliness.”
TIME PIECE AND BOOK
Artschwager’s “Time Piece” and “Book” both look like the objects described in their titles. Both have veneered surfaces. The “book” has no words and no pages, yet the clock is fully functional. They are the same yet opposites. Speaking about works using the veneer and veneer being a photographic image of a material, Artschwager stated, “it was a picture of a piece of wood. If you take that and make something out of it, then you have an object. But it’s a picture of something at the same time, it’s an object.”
ARTSCHWAGER’s COMFORT WITH SIMULTANEOUS COMPREHENSION AND OPAQUENESS
“Ever since our mind learned to fly out of our bodies, we have been moving rapidly from the accessible to the inaccessible, and back, rapidly, most likely because the accessible and the inaccessible have been trading places very fast. Maybe the mind is actually staying right where it is.”
MULTIPLICITY IN MEANING AND EXPERIENCE
In Artschwager’s 1967 essay, “The Hydraulic Door Check”, he states, “The most striking property of doors (although not unique to doors) is RESONANCE between two states, which can be conveniently labels as “open” and “closed”. Resonance is never a simple, unqualified fluctuation between two states; even so in this case. A door — at any given moment — is in a state of being closed with the possibility of its being opened, or in a state of being open with the possibility of its being closed. This is not a speculative model for a door but a description of the state of affairs which immediately existed when the first door was brought into being.” One can expand this notion to an understanding of several of Artschwager’s motifs – 1) veneer as an image of material turned back into a physical object and 2) punctuation marks as physical silent objects completely out of written context yet have the opportunity to comment on all that is around.
ART AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO FULLY EXPERIENCE ALL THAT WHICH IS AROUND
Artschwager stated, “I’m not talking about the apparatus, I’m talking about our being in a primarily social, as opposed to primarily physical, space. Our physical space has been eroded to the point of being endangered, it survives where there are few people and lots of space and where a person or persons can reside in pleasurable solipsism — watching, listening, not editing or throwing anything away … Social space is language-bound and language is always subject-predicate, a Procrustean abridgment of the event which, for instance, allows no excluded middle … Just think back to that time when people lived in the country. One didn’t look at red and green lights — in other words, particles — in order to cross the street, but rather at the full field of vision. And so it is with Matisse. When you sweep your eyes over it, you’re seeing it as it was intended to be seen. It’s so simple.”
OPPOSITES
Richard Armstrong states ”Richard Artschwager has sought to alter the context of viewing by making pictorial sculpture and dimensional, space-occupying paintings. Equally conceptual and physical, his work is not intended as a simple demonstration of thought or as a purely aesthetic experience. He engages mind and body by situating us in front of a thing, often familiar-looking and always convincingly well made.”
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Go To The Light
When: On view through November 5, 2016
Where: Montserrat College of Art, 301 Gallery, 301 Cabot St, Beverly, MA 01915
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Go to the Light is a fluorescence-inspired screen printing show featuring prints by artists from around the country. The exhibition highlight collaborative prints from artists working in a wide range of mediums. Audiences are treated to an immersive and unique viewing experience; galleries lit exclusively in black light for optimal neon viewing. Are you prepared for a psychedelic adventure?
Featured artists and collectives include: Andrew Bablo, Elaine Bay, Joe Barillaro, Brian Butler, Cash For Your Warhol, Cyrille Conan, Michael Crockett, Farel Dalrymple, Michael DiMaggio, Caitlin Duennebier, Pat Falco, Matthew Gamber, Sarah Gay-O’Neill, Frank Germano, Sophie Greenspan, Morgan Grenier, Hungry Ghost Press, Gunsho, David Hochbaum, Stephen Holding, Ness Lee, Michele L’Heureux, Jay LaCouture, Greg Lamarche (SP.ONE), Josh Luke, TJ Kelley III, Marissa Malik, Robert Maloney, Xander Marro, Dan McCarthy, Fish McGill, Morning Breath, Dave Ortega, Anthony Palocci, Helen Popinchalk, Jake Rainis, John Rainis, Michael Sieben, Skinner, Nat Swope, Tallboy, Remi Thornton, James Weinberg, Wilding Davis & co, Nicholas Zaremba.”
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Firm Grip
When: On view through November 2016
Opening Reception: Friday November 4th, 2016, 6PM-8:30PM
Where: Lens Gallery, 524 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Two local artists explore different facets of identity through a collection of paintings and cut paper collages. work by Casey Ausman & Dylan Hurwitz”
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Rachel Mello: That Space Between Flying and Falling
Opening Reception: Friday, Nov. 4, 5:30-8pm
When: On view Nov. 4 – Dec. 18, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday, Nov. 4, 5:30-8pm
Where: Laconia Gallery, 433 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why:“Laconia Gallery is pleased to present a solo show by Rachel Mello, That Space Between Flying and Falling.
Cut silhouettes hang from the ceiling and cast shadows to create an installation simultaneously evoking an emotional landscape and a tangible cityscape. Using a variety of media to explore the interaction of the internal with external, physical world, Mello brings her backgrounds in scenic art and architecture to her fine art. Here she paints clouds and skies in rich hues, on free-hanging cut silhouettes of urban forms.
They’re paintings, but they present themselves in space without a frame. They’re sculptural objects casting shadows, but they’re flat. They’re conceived of and created together, in a way that an installation is not usually composed of paintings. You are invited to find your own way to experience That Space Between Flying and Falling.
Mello has been a resident at Vermont Studio Center, and at the Ucross Foundation in Wyoming, has been a three-time recipient of the Somerville Arts Council Artist Fellowship Award, and a finalist for the Massachusetts Cultural Council’s Artist Fellowship in Painting; she works extensively with community art around the Boston Metro area, especially in Somerville, and this year became an Associate Member at Kingston Gallery. She has an MFA from Brandeis University, a BFA and a BArch from Rhode Island School of Design.”
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Parallel Universe | Leah Piepgras
When: On view through November 18, 2016
Where: GRIN Gallery, 60 Valley St #3, Providence, RI 02909
How: Official Website
What/Why: “We are thrilled to present Parallel Universe, an exhibition of new work by Leah Piepgras. This is the artist’s second solo exhibition at GRIN.”
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Peter Waite | Paintings 1995-1996/ “it’s like déjà vu all over again”
When: On view through November 15, 2016
Where: EBK Gallery, 218 Pearl Street, Hartford, CT
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Paintings 1995-1996/ “it’s like déjà vu all over again”
The 19 paintings in this exhibition were part of a series of 35 that were first shown at the Edward Thorp Gallery, NYC in 1996.
For this series I sought out locations that required special permission to visit and document: “super max” prisons; execution chambers; court rooms; casinos; hospital operating theaters and corporate board rooms. All of these places represented a kind of mid-1990’s “growth industry” and for each location a certain amount of red tape was involved in order to gain access. Because of the volume of images, I decided to work on a smaller scale than before. Single aluminum panels were fabricated for each image. Simply bent at the top and bottom, each hovers off the wall, the aluminum surface is hard and cold while the back side is grey and metallic.
The paired images of “Electric Chair” and “Jury Box” (the latter painting is not in the show) represent the often ironic connections which I look for. Both share decidedly centered vantage points, be it looking “in to” or “out from”, and the single wooden and leather electric chair and the similar twelve juror’s chairs appear to have been made by the same hand.
I want to thank Eric Ben-Kiki for the opportunity to show some of the series again, it seems the “growth industries” that I depicted twenty years ago still remain in place…as Yogi said: “it’s like déjà vu all over again”. -P.W.
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Scott Prior: New Paintings
When: On view through November 30, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday November 4, 6-8PM
Where: Alpha Gallery, 460C Harrison Avenue – Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
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At Home in the Woods
When: On view through November 25, 2016
Where: Maud Morgan Arts, 20A Sacramento Street, Cambridge, MA, 02138
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Birches have nearly taken over my studio,” says artist Marja Lianko, whose upcoming show at the Chandler Gallery features paintings and sculpture depicting—and, in some cases, made of—trees, bark and branches. Lianko is a fixture in the Boston art scene. She taught at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts for 23 years, and has shown her work at the MFA, the Fogg Museum, the DeCordova, the Rose Museum, and the Art Complex Museum. This past spring, she took first prize in the Chandler Gallery’s Small Works Salon.
“Even though birches or trees in general have not always been featured in my work, I like to think that…the spirit of the birch tree has been there,” says Lianko. “The group of images in this show presents the most direct connection to that spirit.”
Lianko is originally from Finland, and the trees in her work evoke the expansive birch forests in her home country. “Kaleva 2” and “Kaleva 3” are clusters of birch twigs whittled into points and painted with whimsical stripes and dots. Says Lianko, “The two ‘Kalevas’ remind me of an ancient musical instrument that I may have seen (or imagined) as a child.”
In “Re-Rooted,” a human head emerges from the trunk of a tree that sports arm-like branches, and from the person’s head grows another smaller tree. The two trees have different kinds of bark, suggesting that the person’s head acts to change the way the tree grows, or that the smaller tree is a new creation that comes only from the person. Or perhaps this is a sculpture of transplants: the person is transplanted into one tree, another tree is transplanted into the person, and all three are learning to take root where they are. The person’s closed eyes and contented expression seem to say that this tree-person, not unlike Lianko, is at home growing new roots from the old.
“Birches, Bark and Beyond: Works by Marja Lianko” will be on display at the Chandler Gallery from October 31-November 25. The opening reception will be held on November 3 from 6-8pm. Maud Morgan Arts is a program under the umbrella of the Agassiz Baldwin Community, a private nonprofit organization that has provided quality programs and services in the Cambridge community for over forty years. Maud Morgan Arts comprises a full arts program of classes and workshops for all ages, the Chandler Gallery, and a collection of original art by noted artist and community resident Maud Morgan (1903-1999). The agency works to reflect the diversity and talents of the community, bringing people together to make art, share art, and support visual arts education.”
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Encapsulated
When: On view through November 19, 2016
Where: Gold Gallery, 460C Harrison Ave, #18, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why: “New works by Christine Flynn and Jay Kelly”
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Tenfold
When: On view through November 12, 2016
Where: 13 Forest Gallery, 167A Massachusetts Ave, Arlington, MA 02474
How: Official Website
What/Why: “13FOREST Gallery is pleased to present TENFOLD, an exhibition celebrating our 10th anniversary. Since opening in 2006, 13FOREST Gallery has championed the recognition of artistic expression in the Boston area, and cultivated lasting, meaningful relationships with its artists. TENFOLDmarks a decade of excellence and celebrates mutual success by featuring the work of 10 artists who collectively represent the gallery’s past, present and future.
TENFOLD reflects 13FOREST’s ongoing commitment to fostering local artists – both established and emerging – and to connecting Boston-area residents with the community of world-class painters, printmakers, sculptors and photographers based across New England. As such, we view our 10th anniversary as an ideal opportunity to highlight a selection of new work by nine artists who have been included in past shows, and by one artist who is new to our fold. TENFOLD proudly features Daniel Benayun, Dominic Chavez, Nicole Duennebier, Susan Jaworski-Stranc, Robert Maloney,Wilhelm Neusser, Heather Pilchard, Mike Ryczek, Kate Sullivan and introduces Mia Cross.
The works brought together in TENFOLD represent the luminous futures of our artists as well as the longevity of 13FOREST Gallery’s mission to make art a part of everyday life.”
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Rise: Climate Change in our World
When: On view through November 12, 2016
Where: 3S Artspace, 319 Vaughan Street, Portsmouth, NH
How: Official Website
What/Why: “The University of New Hampshire Department of Art and Art History will participate this fall in a collaboration devoted to the theme of climate change. Since last year the department has been working with NextGen NH and 3S Artspace to develop an exhibition of art works by current students, alumni, technical staff, and faculty to be exhibited from October 21 to November 12, 2016. “
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Joe Brubaker: Small is Beautiful
When: On view through November 27, 2016
Opening Reception: November 4, 5-8PM
Where: Beth Urdang, 460 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
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HOT PINK, SOFT PINK, RUSTY ORANGE, WHITE
When: On view through December 11, 2016
Opening Reception: November 4th, 5-9PM
Where: How’s Howard, 450 Harrison Ave, Suite 309c, Boston, MA 02118
How: Official Website
What/Why: “How’s Howard? is pleased to present a solo exhibition by Liza Bingham. “Hot Pink, Soft Pink, Rusty Orange, White” consists of paintings completed with sculptural intent. Under muslin surfaces, Bingham’s shaped panels incorporate raised surfaces and curved edges that droop as though time and gravity have played a critical role in their formation.
For this project, a series of four works emphasize Bingham’s use of repetition while exploring semiotics and highlighting what is missing in our current conversation.
Each painting addresses the same composition, layered step-by-step and completed in one sitting. Viewed all together, these works change from one to the next, yet are anchored by the use of a template, giving evidence of the artist’s process. A vaguely familiar shape defined by one continuous brush stroke hugs the confines of each panel. These gestural shapes look symbolic, fashioned after a puzzle piece or state border. With color being the only variant, a limited sense of self-expression or preconceived notion of individuality becomes evident.
Although Bingham’s work appears as non-objective abstraction, these bulky, odd objects take over the space as if they are restless visitors entering into an urgent conversation. “
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Afra Al Dhaheri – Inevitable Ephemera
When: On view November 4 through November 30, 2016
Opening Reception: Friday, November 4, 6-9 pm
Where: T+H Gallery, C19 + C20 460 Harrison Ave, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why:“Inevitable Ephemera is a multi-disciplinary exhibition exploring our rapidly developing world, where change and growth are unavoidable. Growing up in Abu Dhabi, UAE, Al Dhaheri witnessed an epic example of contemporary urban development. She sources inspiration from having lived in a conflicting reality, surrounded by ceaseless construction and hyper-capitalism, whilst simultaneously inhabiting the simplicity of her heritage. Due to the city’s exponential expansion, she had to frequently move homes and schools. It was the rituals of Al Dhaheri’s heritage that acted as constant. This struggle with time and adaptation is reflected in her ever-changing studio practice, where she expresses these phenomena through varied media and processes.
Repetition is another form of ritual for Al Dhaheri. In Inevitable Ephemera, several works are recreated in various mediums. Through this meditative exercise, the artist and viewer can fully experience the object and bodies of work. The intentional deliberation of repetition serves as a remedy for the fast-paced energy of continuous development haunting our and Al Dhaheri’s world – effectively allowing her to slow-down and re-sensitize.
When colossal change is inevitable, adaptation becomes necessity. However, the strong bond between artist and land cannot be lost in this transformation. Al Dhaheri copes with rapid urban expansion and its implications – on the environment and her cultural identity – through her work, by reflecting on this experience with an emphasis on material and process.
Born in 1988 in Dublin, Ireland, and raised in the UAE, Afra Al Dhaheri received a BA in Graphic Design from Zayed University, Abu Dhabi, in 2011. She is currently completing a MFA in Painting from Rhode Island School of Design. In 2014 she completed the prestigious Sheikha Salama Emerging Artist Fellowship in collaboration with RISD. Al Dhaheri’s work is shown nationally and internationally.”
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Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty
When: On view through November 19, 2016
Where: Lesley University, Lunder Arts Center,1801 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Lesley University will be presenting a major retrospective of the work of legendary American photographer Irving Penn (1917-2009). The exhibition is organized by the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC.
Lesley University will be the only site for the exhibition in the Northeast as it travels to five institutions in the United States. Lesley’s exhibition will take place in the university’s new Lunder Arts Center in Cambridge from September 10 to November 19, 2016. The exhibition is accompanied by a series of lectures and events, as well as by a catalogue co-published by The Irving Penn Foundation and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.”
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Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez
When: On view through December 4th, 2016
Where: 808 Gallery, 808 Commonwealth Ave, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Dead Treez showcases the artist’s mixed-media installations and jacquard-woven photo tapestries that explore class, gender, and race through the lens of popular culture, social media, dress, and personal adornment. Patterson’s highly embellished, illuminated imagery is intended to captivate the viewer in order to look beyond her mesmerizing surfaces for deeper meanings.
Influenced by Jamaica’s dancehall culture, Jamaican-born Patterson explores the paradoxical relationship between traditional gender codes and the bombastic aesthetics of dancehall pageantry, presenting a complex vision of masculinity. Dead Treez is an immersive meditation on dancehall fashion and culture, regarded as a celebration of the disenfranchised in postcolonial Jamaica.
Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez was organized by The John Michael Kohler Arts Center and gratitude is extended BMO Harris Bank, Herzfeld Foundation, and Sargento Food, Inc., for major support of this exhibition and to the Wisconsin Arts Board, with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts. Funding was also provided by the Friends of Fiber Art International and the members of the Exhibitions & Collections Giving Circle. Arts Center programs are also made possible by the generous support of its members.”
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Wind and Water
When: On view through November 13, 2016
Where: Fountain Street Fine Art, 59 Fountain Street, Framingham MA, 01702
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Using acrylics, Mary Spencer paints a fossil fantasy world with realistic drawings of primitive life-forms. As species evolve over millions of years and others disappear, fossils are a reminder that we are all but a fragile presence on the planet’s shell. The sea swells dark and deep, holding fathomless secrets…. fossilized yet luminous.
Anne Sargent Walker’s mixed media paintings explore the beauty, complexity and fragility of the natural world, and our complicated relationship with it. The surface content of birds, flora and other creatures often degrades, peels back, dissolves or drips to reveal layers underneath, suggesting loss of habitat, species, the earth itself and, of course, us.”
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MFA Now Overnight: State of the Party
When: Friday November 4th through Saturday November 5th, 2016
Where: Museum of Fine Arts, 465 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115
How: Official Website
What/Why: “On Friday, November 4, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), hosts the third of four free all-night parties in the Linde Family Wing for Contemporary Art as part of #mfaNOW, a season celebrating contemporary art and artists.
Taking place the weekend before the presidential election, the “State of the Party” overnight takes a look at politics in Boston and beyond with special events and activities. Visitors are invited to bring their ideas to a Chief Chat hosted by SPARK Boston, join a lively discussion on 2016 hosted by Boston Globe politics reporter James Pindell and participate in programs presented by Epicenter Community in Political Intent and Beyond Limits.
Musical performances curated by YVNG PAVL from CLLCTV Boston and featuring local DJs will take place in two locations throughout the night. The party also features food trucks, a late-night workout by Heartbreak Hill Running Company, art making, interactive installations by MIT Hacking Arts and Harvard University’s metaLAB, and live mural making in the galleries by Cyrille Conan.
Exhibitions also on view include UH-OH: Frances Stark 1991–2015; Christian Marclay: The Clock and Terry Winters: The Structure of Things. Free admission will begin at 9 pm at the Linde Family Wing Entrance on a first-come, first-served basis, and continue until 9 am on Saturday, November 5.”
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Newton Open Studios Juried Fall Fest
When: November 5-6, 2016 11 am – 5 pm.
Where: Newton City Hall, Newton, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “A 2-day Show and Sale of Fine Art and Craft, at Newton City Hall. November 5-6, Saturday & Sunday 11am to 5pm. This year’s jurors are ARTSCOPE’s Kaveh Mojtabai (Founder and Publisher) and Brian Goslow (Managing Editor). See painting, photography, jewelry. ceramics, woodcuts, woven goods, watercolor and more.”
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South Boston Open Studios
When: November 5th and 6th, 2016 12:00-6:00PM
Where: The Following locations in South Boston–
555 Gallery // 555 East 2nd St. Boston, MA 02127
The Distillery // 516 East 2nd St. Boston, MA 02127
King Terminal // 110 K St. Boston, MA 02127
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Twice a year the artists and craftspeople of South Boston open their doors to share their work and their studios with the public. Come meet the artists and discover what’s new on the Southie art scene. South Boston Open Studios is free and open to the public, rain or shine. ”
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A Group Thing
When: On view through November 2016
Opening Reception: Sunday, November 6 at 5 PM – 9 PM
Where: Thomas Young Gallery, 516 East 2nd Street, Boston, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “A group exhibition featuring work by: Aaron Luckman | Adam O’Day | Aggie Pavlidis | Aimee Odum | Alex Simon | Alison Safford | Allison Tanenhaus | Allison Maria Rodriguez | Bill Porter | Bob Bicknell-Knight | Brandon Aguiar | Brian Donnelly | Caitlin McDonagh | Caitlin & Nicole Duennebier | Catherine Siller | Claudine Metrick | Conley Harris | Cris Schayer | Cyd Gottlieb | Cyrille Conan | Damion Silver | David Tolmie | David Buckley Borden | Hissy Fit | Donna Ingemanson | Eden Mitsenmacher | Elaine Thap | Elizabeth Keithline | Emily Ottinger | Evan Gilbert | Farrell Mason-Brown | Free Marseille | Gemica B. Rosenberg | Jack Byers | Jamieson Edson | Jay Riggio | Jay Lacouture | Jennifer Murphy | Sid and Jim | Jocelyn Tsaih | John Pagano | Kathleen Bitetti | Katie Lee Haley | Kyle Bryant | Laia Albaladejo | Laura FIschman | Marie-Anne Verougstraete | Marina Massidda | Marissa Malik | Marnie White | Matthew Dickey | Matthew Zaremba | Michael Costello | Michael Mittelman | Mike Dacey | Mike Biskup | Monika Plioplyte | Nathan Brescia | Nick Zaremba | Olivia Portegello | Papatson | Rachel Tine | Rebecca Volynsky | Renee Browne | Renée Ricciardi | Renée Silva | Rory Beerits | Rose Leitner | Shaun Maclean Marrow | Shawna Koontz | Shireen Patel | Silvi Naci | Stacy Lovejoy | Stephen Holding | Susan Greer Emmerson | T.D. Heavican | Tim McCool | Vanessa Irzyk | William Griffin | YuHsin Wu | Jesse Jagtiani”
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Obstacle Course @ NAC
When: On view through November 22, 2016
Where: New Art Center, 61 Washington Park, Newtonville, MA 02460
How: Official Website
What/Why: A Curatorial Opportunity Program Exhibition
Participating artists:
Caitlin Berrigan (Germany)
Tal Gafny (Israel)
and Alyssa Carson (US)
Ghana ThinkTank (US)
Courtney McClellan (US)
Cathy McLaurin (Boston)
Nicola Singh (UK)
Joanna Tam (Boston)
Garett Yahn (Boston)
curators:
Courtney McClellan (US)
Cathy McLaurin (Boston)
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Plastic Imagination
When: On view through January 15, 2017
Where: Fitchburg Art Museum, 185 Elm Street, Fitchburg, MA 01420
How: Official Website
What/Why: “Plastic – a product inextricably tied to the manufacturing history of North Central Massachusetts – has many characteristics that make it fantastically unique. This multi-purpose material can be luminous, colorful, lightweight, strong, durable, practical, playful, affordable, and aerodynamic. It can conjure associations with industrial accomplishment, foment feelings of nostalgia, and trigger very real fears about consumption and waste.
FAM’s Fall 2016 exhibition, Plastic Imagination, explores the work of 10 contemporary New England artists who create extraordinary things with all kinds of plastics. Lisa Barthelson, Tom Deininger, Dana Filibert, Joseph Fucigna, Lynne Harlow, Niho Kozuru, Margaret Roleke, Dean Snyder, Bill Thompson, and Brian Zink all find inspiration in the fillers, films and moldable plastics made popular throughout the last century. Some shave, sand, sculpt, and paint different densities of foam. Some play up the translucent or opaque qualities of Plexi or Fiberglass, and some recycle plastic toys, treasures, and trash. Some present readily accessible, everyday plastics as strictly formal studies, while others crave the layers of meaning (social, political, cultural, environmental, and economic) that result from a focus on this ubiquitous and arguably indispensable material.“
Affiliated programming:
Gallery Talks with Lisa Barthelson, Niho Kozuru, and Bill Thompson
November 6, 2:00 p.m.
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Nick Cave: Until
When: On view through October 14, 2017
Where: MASS MoCA, 1040 MASS MoCA WAY, North Adams, MA 01247
How: Official Website
What/Why: “A paradisiacal landscape where [black-faced lawn] jockeys appear — made from the crystals that would normally go into chandeliers, on a raised platform accessible via four ladders — is the heart of “Until.” “I had been thinking about gun violence and racism colliding,” Mr. Cave said. “And then I wondered: Is there racism in heaven? That’s how this piece came about.” Read the full profile in The New York Times.
If you think you know Nick Cave, think again. The artist celebrated for his wearable sculptures called Soundsuits turns expectations inside out at MASS MoCA in a massive immersive installation opening October 16, 2016, where not a single Soundsuit will be found. Instead, Cave uses MASS MoCA’s signature football field-sized space to create his largest installation to date, made up of thousands of found objects and millions of beads, which will make viewers feel as if they have entered a rich sensory tapestry, like stepping directly inside the belly of one of his iconicSoundsuits.
The exhibition will also be used as a performance space. Conceived as a one-year concatenation of community events, music, theater, and art, Until incorporates special appearances by dancers, singer-songwriters, pop artists, poets, and composers, together with panel discussions, community forums, and other forms of creative public debate and engagement.
Often seen as celebrations of movement and material, the first Soundsuit, made out of twigs, was a direct response to the Rodney King beating, a visual image about social justice that was both brutal and energizing. Just as the violence of the Rodney King beating was the impetus to Cave’s early work, the death of men such as Eric Garner, Trayvon Martin, and Michael Brown drive his new imagery. For Cave’s new MASS MoCA installation, Until—a double play on the phrase “innocent until proven guilty” or in this case, perhaps, “guilty until proven innocent”—Cave addresses issues of gun violence, gun control policy, and race relations in America today.
Until begins with a dense sculptural field of metallic lawn ornaments leading to a crystal cloud topped by a private garden populated with birds, flowers, and black-face lawn jockeys, finally coming to rest before a cliff wall constructed of millions of plastic pony beads. This is an active space where alluring kinetics and a sumptuous materiality are suddenly punctuated by images of guns, bullets, and targets, positioning us all as culpable, vulnerable, and potentially under attack. The aim of this is pointed, sparking discussion about important issues in a space that is at once dazzling, provocative, and—ultimately—optimistic. Cave believes in humanity, celebrating possibility while also creating a forum for sharp debate and critical discussion.
“I view this work as a theater set, or an elaborate community forum, as much as a work of sculpture,” he notes.
This is Nick Cave from the inside out, on a grand theatrical scale.”
Also on view..
Alex da Corte: Free Roses
What/Why: The New York Times dives into the immersive world of Alex Da Corte, in which the artist’s “riotous post-post-Pop sensibility” transforms MASS MoCA’s galleries into a “ravishing and terrifying” environment of sculpture and video installations.
Sebastian Smee writes, “Da Corte’s feeling for form and color, and his ability to squeeze a nonchalant poetry out of the most banal-seeming objects, is spellbinding.” Read the Pulitzer Prize-winning critic’s full review of Alex Da Corte: Free Roses inThe Boston Globe.
Provocative, puzzling, and visually seductive, in his first museum survey Alex Da Corte’s neon-bright, exuberant works merge the languages of abstraction and modern design with banal, off-brand items, ranging from shampoo to soda to tchotchkes and household cleaning supplies. Acid-hued and organized with a rigorous formal logic, Da Corte’s mash-ups mine products of domestic life—which he finds on pilgrimages to supermarkets, flea markets, and dollar stores—for unexpected visual appeal as well as emotional and libidinous impact. Heir to Pop artists of the 1960s, Da Corte combines common consumer objects with popular culture, personal family narratives—and other artists’ work—in vibrant installations of sculptures, paintings, and videos. Taking over MASS MoCA’s second-floor galleries, Free Roses features a selection of works made over the last ten years, as well as a major new installation, which serves as a conceptual fulcrum for the entire show.”
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The Intimacy of Memory
When: On view through November 22, 2016
Opening Reception: Thursday November 10, 2016
Where: New Art Center, 61 Washington Park, Newton, MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “ The New Art Center (NAC) is pleased to announce The Intimacy of Memory: Reframing Loss and Overcoming Stigma in the Face of Opioid Overdose. Through this multifaceted project, NAC student Nancy Marks and her collaborator, Annie Brewster MD, invite members of the Greater Boston community to honor and remember loved ones lost in the opioid epidemic, and to rethink the narrative surrounding stigmatized deaths. The project, premised on the belief that healthy mourning is a human right, began with a free workshop that invited participants to bring photographs and mementos left behind from departed loved ones and use them to create works of art. The pieces created are now on display in an exhibition that illustrates through images and audio recordings the participants’ stories and memories. By honoring the complexity of the grieving process as well as the worth of the human beings who are gone, The Intimacy of Memory creates a forum for family members to express their grief and facilitates healing through the expression and sharing of memories in both visual and audio form.
The reception, being held on Thursday, November 10 at 6PM, will feature an interactive discussion aimed at reshaping how we think about and support all of those who are affected by this crisis in our communities. Also, local educational theater group,Improbable Players, will perform “End of the Line,” a short play inspired by real young people dealing with the opiod epidemic.”
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Robert Lewis Sculpture
When: On view November 4 – December 16, 2016
Where: Rafius Fane Gallery, 460C Harrison Ave, Suite #C24, Boston MA
How: Official Website
What/Why: “The art, archaeology and artifacts of past civilizations inspire Robert Lewis’s sculpture. Intrigued by the layering of visual information left by empires, cultures, and the whims of nature, he has traveled to experience these things in their full dimensions and in the context for which they were intended. He uses imagery from archeology and classical art and architecture, along with references to pop culture, literature, films, graphic novels and current events. The disparate artists who influence Lewis range from Bosch and Caravaggio to Frank Frazetta and the illustrators of D.C. Comics. He regards each piece as a perpetual work in progress; for him, they are never quite finished. His goal is to give the viewer the sense of wonder and excitement he experiences during their creation in the studio.”
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/FIN.
As far as #bosarts between November 4th and November 10th, did I miss anything?
Let me know:
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TODAY’S HEADLINES:
November is going to look a bit different around these parts.
Assuming you enjoy free & frequent content, this will be a good thing.
Now that Fertile Solitude has left the nest, I plan to shift the focus back to FLUX.
In particular:
-Excited about a new series of posts (4-5) I’ve been working on, one of which will feature an art world celebrity guest.
-I will start addressing this mess..
-AND I’m going to experiment with returning the wrap-up to a weekly format.
It’s been a few months of monthly, but I’m realizing the monthly might be a bit much to digest.. It’s hard to comb through 70+ listings to figure out what to do on a weekend, and I can only imagine the post itself must be breaking your phone.
Pros of Weekly Format:
-frequency
-easier to digest
-same amount of work for me (I think?)
-exhibition’s affiliated programming (special one day event/talk/performance) will be highlighted rather than buried
Cons of Weekly Format:
-Unsure how best to address the issue of overlap with ongoing events and exhibitions. ie: exhibition featured in November 4th wrap up is still on view the the 11th, but it won’t appear in the latter post.
-if it’s no longer a monthly summary, will it be harder for you (dear reader) to plan your life?
-Will I be able to source enough incredible GIFs to sustain a weekly format?
Only time will tell.
But for now, let’s give this a shot. And if we hate it, we will never speak of November again. ♥
