When the original Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Gallery at the College of the Holy Cross, formerly in O’Kane Hall, was dedicated in 1983 Rev. John E. Brooks, S.J. president emeritus of Holy Cross declared: “An undergraduate liberal arts college is academically strengthened when its students and staff are exposed to works of art.”
The current Cantor Gallery, on the third floor of the Prior Performing Arts Center designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro that opened in 2022, is a glass-enclosed space with a soaring ceiling, a capacious light-filled room where exhibits are installed with encouragement to wander. It is a perfect space for the retrospective of former 25-year faculty member Michael Beatty’s “Fabrications.” Beatty taught Sculpture and 3D Design in the college’s Studio Art Department.
Having recently explored the Henry Moore and Georgia O’Keeffe dual exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, it was possible to see a dusting of Moore’s influence in the gorgeous linear works composed of bent birch and steel: “The Trouble with Painting” and “Twist Hold,” which are large swooping wood and metal installations on the center of the gallery floor. They are like hot car tracks where your eye can glide wildly up, down, in and out, enjoying the ride.