Welcome to our September/October 2014 issue; As is normally the case at summer’s unofficial end, we’ve put together this issue at a time when most shows that’ll be on view this fall have yet to be installed, and we’ve had to be creative in how to preview the exhibitions we wished to spotlight. That can mean writers get the opportunity to visit artists in their workspaces so they can see the work before it’s shipped to a gallery or museum; or, when it came to previewing David Edgar’s first United States exhibi- tion at Half Crown Design in Cambridge, Mass., it meant Greg Morell Skyping with the charcoal and pastel artist at his studio in Tasmania, Australia. And wouldn’t you have loved to listen in as artscope’s Kristin Nord spoke by phone with beloved New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast about her “Being, Nothingness and Much, Much More” exhibition at Connecticut’s Bruce Museum?

I’m one of those people who believe that summer doesn’t end on Labor Day Weekend; instead, I optimistically look forward to Indian Summer creating a reason to escape for one more great outdoor adventure in October. Along these lines, J. Fatima Martins traveled to Vermont for the North Bennington Outdoor Sculpture Show, which remains on view through October 25, while Suzanne Volmer immersed herself in the Sculpture Embraces Horticulture exhibition that continues through Halloween at the Blithewold Mansion, Gardens and Arboretum in Bristol, Rhode Island.

Similarly, we encourage you to visit warm-weather favorites Kennebunk, Maine — to see Francine Schrock and Linda Murray’s work at the Sharpe Gallery, profiled in this issue by Taryn Plumb — and Cape Cod, where the Provincetown Art Association and Museum is celebrating its 100th anniversary with the fourth installment of its year-long “A Century of Inspira- tion,” covering 1990 to the present, and its spectacular “Karl Knaths: Beyond Form and Freedom” solo show, reviewed here by Laura Shabott, who also profiles the institution’s glorious history.

I’ve been waiting for the opportunity to feature Boston-area sculptor Ruth Rosner in these pages since being introduced to her work while co-jurying last summer’s New England Collective IV at Galatea Fine Art with artscope publisher Kaveh Mojtabai. As I write this, her unique “totemic art” is on display at
Roxbury Community College’s Joan Resnikoff Gallery as part of its “What About War” showcase, in conjunction with the Boston-area series of “Violence Transformed” exhibitions that also include “(Un) Covering Violence Trans- formed,” at Copley Place Center Court through September 12. For his portrait of Rosner, James Foritano did a great job of not only capturing her unique torsos, but also sharing the spirit behind her work.

Mojtabai unintentionally gave us a double feature for this issue when, in the role of juror, he selected Sammy Chong as the best of show for his “Asterion” graphite drawings at the Milton Art Museum’s annual juried show. It meant the work, originally scheduled to be displayed at what turned out to be a simultaneous show at Regis College’s Carney Gallery, had to be replaced by “[In]terim,” an earlier series of Plexiglas creations by Chong. Puloma Ghosh, who served an internship with us this summer after graduating from Tufts University, previews both shows here. Hopefully, this will be the start of a long career for her as a professional art writer.

Detroit received a lot of nationwide attention when it offered artists an abandoned or foreclosed home for $100 back in 2009 with the hope of stabilizing some of its neighborhoods; the end result was that many creative people started dreaming about what they would do with such an opportunity. When Elizabeth Michelman pitched me the idea for a story about her Waltham, Mass. studio-space colleague Bryan Papciak, a Rhode Island School of Design film teacher, and his participation in a project to create “a kind of contem- porary ‘wunderkammer’ in Detroit,” it felt like a good chance to show how larger dreams can become reality. I hope you find her feature on the Seaform Palace: A Museum of Curiosity inspirational.

This issue’s centerfold contest winner, with an original surrealism theme, is Joey Mars’ acrylic, oil stick, enamel and collage on canvas “Visitors” painting. Thanks to our judges: Elena Bachrach, executive director of the Newburyport Art Associ- ation and Sara Bogosian, director of the Whistler House Museum. For our next contest, we’re looking for your original winter-themed painting work; full details can be found in our Classifieds section.

Many thanks to all of you who’ve gone to exhibitions featured in our July/ August issue and told the host galleries and museums that you learned about them through the pages of artscope — as well as our various social media offerings, be it on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram — or our bi-weekly email blast!s composed and written by Lacey Daley. That commu- nication goes a long way in helping us convince New England’s cultural institu- tions that there is a valuable two-way relationship to be had partnering with us — a relationship we don’t take for granted.

That was the case when we followed up our preview of the South Coast Artists Open Studios Tours in our last issue with daily Facebook reminders over the days leading up to the event with the hope of reinforcing knowledge of the event throughout the region; we were pleased to learn afterwards that large crowds visited many of the 90 or so participating studios and that many of the artists successfully sold their work to customers new and old. As we plan each issue with the intention of giving our readers the opportunity to travel to see the work described in these pages in person, nothing is as rewarding as news like this.

As always, I encourage you to send me your suggestions of artists, galleries, museums and performing arts organiza- tions we may not have already covered in the pages of artscope. While the genres covered in this issue range from collage, neon and fiber arts to encaustics, video and glass, there’s still so much more for us all to discover and enjoy throughout the New England arts community.

Brian Goslow, managing editor (bgoslow@artscopemagazine.com)