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New England's Culture Magazine

Artscope Magazine | July/August 2019

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Artscope Online

Public and Private: John Buron and Abigael McGuire at AS220 Project Space and Reading Room

// Artscope Online, Featured, Visual Arts

by J. Fatima Martins

Two individual installations by John Buron and Abigael McGuire, opposites from one another in terms of materials, inception source and purpose, yet similar in how they reveal contemporary relevant concerns, are on view now through August 31 at AS220 in Providence, Rhode Island. The focus of today's contemporary culture is attention to addressing the interior personal (private lives) in combination with exterior tangible (public culture). How do Buron and McGuire do this? Abigael McGuire's "Energies and Poetries," exhibited in the Project Space, is a three-part collection of drawings — two series of flat mixed-media abstract line drawings, and a series of text scrolls - that explore the emotionality and power of gesture line showing that the line itself is both abstract and vague — energy — and also representative of reality — poetry. John Buron's "Displacement" is a mixed-media and … [Read more...] about Public and Private: John Buron and Abigael McGuire at AS220 Project Space and Reading Room

  DOUGLAS BREAULT: SOFT FOCUS AT FORT POINT ARTS COMMUNITY MAIN GALLERY

// Artscope Online, Featured, Visual Arts

by J. Fatima Martins

On view now through August 5, eight mixed media collage works, including a sculpture, by Douglas Breault, are featured in “Soft Focus,” an exhibition at the Fort Point Arts Community Main Gallery showing some of the best approaches to contemporary conceptual art happening right now. The works on view are a perfect blending of physicality and intellectualism. Breault is a visual composer of subtle narratives, at first appearing completely abstract engaging only form and materials, but then slowly revealing poignant, mysterious and poetic stories. For Breault, the art arrives from a place of realism. From a solid place, he allows the materials themselves to express their true rawness and emotive situations to live and expand out, transmuting into unexpected ideas. What appears as happenstance and chaos is organized, purposeful and planned. From physical real points, Breault then pushes … [Read more...] about   DOUGLAS BREAULT: SOFT FOCUS AT FORT POINT ARTS COMMUNITY MAIN GALLERY

The Bauhaus and Harvard at the Harvard Art Museums

// Artscope Online, Exhibits, Featured, Visual Arts

by James Foritano

If you’re curious about painting, architecture, sculpture, woodcuts, textiles or any of the allied arts, now is the time (or really past time!) to scurry to the Harvard Art Museums, head straight to Special Exhibitions on the third floor and … linger, seriously. It is, after all, the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Bauhaus in Weimar, Germany, and Harvard has been celebrating already since February! And you? The important thing is not to blame yourself. Not that you don’t deserve it, but save it at least until the end of July when this celebration finally runs out of breath. And, if you’re still reading, don’t read every label, for goodness sake, or you’ll be there ’til the end of July, panting! Celebrate, if lately, with the rest of the party by realizing that if the Bauhaus knew anything, it knew, and knows still, the truth of that old saw: “One picture is worth a … [Read more...] about The Bauhaus and Harvard at the Harvard Art Museums

Unfoldingobject at Concord Center for the Visual Arts

// Artscope Online, Featured, Visual Arts

by J. Fatima Martins

On view now through August 11 at the Concord Center for the Visual Arts, “unfoldingobject” collage is a formidable exhibition, featuring the work of 50 artists, presenting an expansive understanding of what collage art is physically as well as conceptually while also highlighting the meaning of uncollage. Curated by collage artist, writer and intellectual, Todd Bartel, who is also a participating artist, the collection of works on view range from standard cut-and-paste on flat surfaces to three-dimensional forms of collage-layering and three-dimensional assemblage and sculpture, and painting, that takes on collage as a style. “unfoldingobject is a neologism created to describe the quality in a particular work of art that provokes discovery upon each encounter,” Bartel writes in the curator’s statement. “Despite the ceaseless innovation that it provides, collage is often overlooked or … [Read more...] about Unfoldingobject at Concord Center for the Visual Arts

TASTEFUL CONFRONTATION IN THE NATIONAL OPEN JURIED EXHIBITION AT PROVIDENCE ART CLUB

// Artscope Online, Exhibits, Featured, Visual Arts

by J. Fatima Martins

On view now through July 19, this year’s National Open Juried Exhibition (NOJE) offers a satisfying view of contemporary voices ranging, as expected from Providence Art Club (PAC), from the traditional to the experimental. There is only one problem, which hopefully Michael Rose and this team will correct next year: the NOJE needs examples of new media including digital and video/film and installation within the mixed-media and new technology formats. This year’s presentation is slightly smaller in the number of works, more manageable, and is less aggressive concerning subject matter with overt political and cultural commentary. Unlike last year in which the feeling of political activism was obvious, this year, the works on view offer more subtle and elegant visual remarks about ongoing relevant social and cultural concerns. The work that marks the exhibition with the tone of tasteful … [Read more...] about TASTEFUL CONFRONTATION IN THE NATIONAL OPEN JURIED EXHIBITION AT PROVIDENCE ART CLUB

Wandering in the Crossroads: Qian Wu

// Artscope Online, Exhibits, Featured, Visual Arts

by Nancy Nesvet

“Wandering in the Crossroads,” an exhibition of Qian Wu’s latest works, co-curated by Lan Zhan and Elga Wimmer, opened at Elga Wimmer PCC, New York, on June 19.  From the city of Xiamen in Fujian province, China, Wu has been painting since the age of six. His practice stems from academic studies, including an undergraduate major in social and cultural analysis and a master’s degree from Columbia University’s Weatherhead East Asian Institute as well as studio courses. The removal of boundaries of eastern and western iconography, and an integration of traditional Chinese painting with the bold strokes of western abstraction and the combination of different media signify his work. Rather than the marks and architectural patterning of Franz Kline or Hans Hofmann, who Wu cited as influences, these canvases ( mixing concepts and media: oil, acrylic, ink and watercolor) resemble the early … [Read more...] about Wandering in the Crossroads: Qian Wu