I like to joke that I found freedom in Maine. And in a way, it’s true. Recently, I traveled up the coast to the small town of Freedom for a much-needed weekend away. While there, I was delighted to find not just the peaceful, bucolic scenery I had been craving but also a region bursting with local flavor — from lobster shacks, farm-to-table restaurants and an Amish charcuterie to open studios, galleries and off the beaten path museums. Though summer is nearly over, the foliage will soon be blazing, and there is plenty of time to visit Midcoast Maine before winter. Local Color Gallery and Local Foods // Belfast, ME Belfast, at the mouth of the Passagassawakeag River, has a bustling arts scene for such a small city. Many artists live and work in the region, displaying their work in Belfast’s many galleries, and the city hosts a monthly Fourth Friday Art Walk. Finch Gallery, Belfast … [Read more...] about MIDCOAST MAINE: LOCAL COLOR AND FOODS AWAIT FALL ADVENTURERS
Current Exhibits
RE-PIECING THE SHELL: DARWIN “BROKEN, BUT NOT BAD” AT REGIS
What does an artist do after a devastating divorce and death of her mother? With the invention of psychoanalytical theory by Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Alfred Adler and others, the path was open for artists to make emotional self-examination a physical reality in painting, sculpture and the arts. Susan Darwin’s inventive oil paintings, that open the fall exhibition schedule at Regis College’s Carney Gallery, flow directly from the emotional highs and lows that she has faced in life. Her paintings belong to the genre of biographical artwork that has been in fashion for most of the modern era. Darwin’s “100 Broken Shells” explicitly deal with her unhappy divorce and the depression that resulted. While in a sad state, walking along Shaws Cove beach in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, she looked down at broken shells and an inspiring thought came to her: “They are broken, but not bad!” Picking up … [Read more...] about RE-PIECING THE SHELL: DARWIN “BROKEN, BUT NOT BAD” AT REGIS
DISAPPEARING IN PLEIN AIR: HUNTER GOES BETWEEN MEMORY AND PHOTOGRAPHY
Ask folks who know Vermont artist Charlie Hunter’s work to describe it and you might hear words like “ethereal and mysterious,” “straightforward and real” and “highly evocative.” Ask them to describe the man, and they are likely to say “funny,” “smart,” “sensitive” and “thoughtful.” They would all be right. Hunter, who lives in the small town of Bellows Falls, once a mill town, on the banks of the Connecticut River dividing Vermont and New Hampshire, works in a sprawling studio housed in an old paper mill. A visit there reveals how labor intensive his work is and reveals his creative and philosophical approach to his work. “I’m fascinated with how each viewer brings their life, memories and associations to a painting or work of art,” Hunter said. “I try to create a resonance that conspires to exist between memory and photography. By mimicking old photographic techniques, I can … [Read more...] about DISAPPEARING IN PLEIN AIR: HUNTER GOES BETWEEN MEMORY AND PHOTOGRAPHY
NORMAN ROCKWELL & HIS CONTEMPORARIES OPENS AT THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ILLUSTRATORS; ROCKWELL MUSEUM TEAMS UP WITH COLLECTIVE ARTS BREWING
In conjunction with the 50th anniversary celebration at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts (see Artscope Magazine’s May/June 2019 issue for feature on this season’s exhibition highlights), the National Museum of American Illustrators in Newport, Rhode Island will debut its newest exhibition on May 23, culminating with a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing that occurred on July 20, 1969. “Norman Rockwell & His Contemporaries: Fabulous Forties to Sensational Sixties” focuses on the 1940s through the 1960s, a time in American history when significant political and social changes were defining daily life for post-WWII Americans, and those who lived through the Cold War, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. Works include “Another Way to Go” by Stevan Dohanos, John Falter’s “Family Picnic” and Richard Stone’s 1956 advertisement for … [Read more...] about NORMAN ROCKWELL & HIS CONTEMPORARIES OPENS AT THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ILLUSTRATORS; ROCKWELL MUSEUM TEAMS UP WITH COLLECTIVE ARTS BREWING
TOWARD AWARENESS AND SOLUTIONS: CONSIDERING CLIMATE CHANGE AT THE VENICE BIENNALE — DAY THREE
It is fitting that on my last day at the Venice Biennale, as on my first, it is raining buckets, only underscoring what I perceived as the themes of the biennale: false facts and the implications of global warming on climate change. Regarding false facts, the Indigenous Peoples exhibit, “Volume 0,” establishing its place as an original document, was held at the Zuecca Project Space outside the Giardini grounds. Sponsored by the Venezia Fondamenta Sant’Anna, organized by Dr. Max Carocci, the “Indigenous Peoples” pavilion showed a video on four medicine-ball size spheres, sequentially narrating the story of Venice’s impact on 16th century North American settlements. It said that trade and the necessity of acquiring gold and gems for trade provided the impetus for invading other lands, and Venice was a crossroads of trade. The video’s narration began, “We think of these explorers, taught … [Read more...] about TOWARD AWARENESS AND SOLUTIONS: CONSIDERING CLIMATE CHANGE AT THE VENICE BIENNALE — DAY THREE
FALSE FACTS ON DISPLAY BY ARTISTS: DAY TWO AT THE VENICE BIENNALE
VENICE, ITALY, MAY 9, 2019 — I spent my second day at the Venice Biennale touring the national pavilions at the Giardini site and in other areas in Venice. The most beautiful exhibit I saw was on the second floor of the Russia pavilion, where the director of the 2004 film, Russian Ark and the 2011 winner of the Golden Lion at Venice, “Faust,” directed an exhibit that featured a life-size giclée of a Rembrandt painting, “The Return of the Prodigal Son” on permanent display at the Hermitage, here along with the biblical verse, The Parable of the Prodigal Son from the Gospel of Luke, and Chapter 15 of the Gospel of Luke, that speaks of property deeded to a son by a father, squandered by the son, further illustrated with statues of biblical figures. On two video screens were a vision of fires burning down buildings in present and biblical times, with Jesus sitting on a rock watching the … [Read more...] about FALSE FACTS ON DISPLAY BY ARTISTS: DAY TWO AT THE VENICE BIENNALE