by Sara Farizan NEW BEDFORD, MA-Mother Nature is all around us, but very few of us take the time to appreciate her. When we aren't busy with work or family, we busy ourselves with computer screens, television screens, cell phone screens and any thing that can screen our sight of the great outdoors. Who better then to embrace and notice all of Mother Nature's nuances than an artist who happens to also be a mother? Amanda Swain Bingham goes back to her roots in documentary photography in her new show at the Colo Colo gallery this month. Swain Bingham studied under Bill Burke, a renowned photographer who told her to photograph what she knew. This lead to Swain Bingham's well received 'Til Death Do Us Part' series, chronicling her parents' divorce in 1996. Since then she has had a long career showing her work at the Howard Yezerski Gallery, the Boston Museum School's Grossman Gallery; … [Read more...] about Mother Nature Inspires a Mother in Nature
Exhibits
“Small Gods and Heroes”, A Prolific Exhibit from a Prolific Artist
by Sara Farizan NEWTON- We live in an age where oftentimes the wrong people are idealized. We put professional athletes on a pedestal one day, only to vilify them the next when they underperform, or dance at a club after losing the big game. Box office celebrities become untouchable, a different class of person of almost God-like proportions with their chiseled good looks and public relations dream teams. Ed Smith, hopes to remind the public of how to retain our humanity and remind ourselves of the Gods and Heroes ancient Greece once cherished. Smith, has a list of accolades as long as Santa's list of naughty and nice children, though he is too modest to ever boast about it. He has had over 40 solo exhibitions, is a Guggenheim Fellow in Sculpture and Drawing as well as an Associate Fellow of the Royal British Society of Sculptors. His work has been reviewed by the New York … [Read more...] about “Small Gods and Heroes”, A Prolific Exhibit from a Prolific Artist
‘Mans and Other’ leads to ‘What She Saw’ at Albright Gallery
by Sara Farizan CONCORD- The Albright has always been up to the challenge of stretching it's guests boundaries and collective imaginations, but two of it's shows, one currently exhibiting and the next to follow, will have you wondering where the edge of reality and the abstract actually meet. The Albright begins this surreal journey with George Herman's second solo show Mans and Other. Herman has used abstract imagery and dream-like landscapes before in his work. This time he re-visits neglected aspects of his older pieces by scraping paint and surfacing old textures and forms to make a new work. What is old becomes new and Herman doesn't end there. His portraits are an amalgam of different images of people from mug shots to embarrassing year book photos or glossy advertisements to create, as he refers to it, "realistic portraits of imaginary people". In his portrait, "Girl 2", … [Read more...] about ‘Mans and Other’ leads to ‘What She Saw’ at Albright Gallery
reThink INK: Boston Printmakers Members Show 2010: Red Section
By Ash Saraga WORCESTER - Initially made up of 181 prints when it was first displayed in its entirety at the Zullo Gallery in Medfield, Mass, the “reThink INK: Boston Printmakers Members Show 2010” has subsequently been split into three separate shows — the Red, Blue and Green collection — and has been showing across the United States at both commercial and college galleries. The “Red Section,” featuring 60 works, opened at Worcester State’s recently renovated gallery on January 26; four of the featured artists were present to talk about their work, and give demonstrations of their techniques. “reThink INK” is aptly named, as directions accompany every print in the series from the artist on how each piece was made. Boston Printmakers board member Vivian Berman said a major point of having an exhibition on a college campus is to provide background that enhances the students’ learning … [Read more...] about reThink INK: Boston Printmakers Members Show 2010: Red Section
Octopi Gallery Mural brings Street Art Indoors
by Sara Farizan PORTLAND, ME-Street Art has become a more formidable, political and respected medium in recent years with the likes of British Banksy becoming a household name. Part graffiti, part mural and part drawing, street art can bring an idea or a statement to masses of people without them ever even realizing. That's why the Octopi Gallery in Portland, Maine allowed three of their previously featured artists to create a mural of 40 feet in width and 11 feet in height sprawling across two walls. The Octopi gallery is a part of the Ove Bodytherapy experience, a studio that provides massages, acupuncture and yoga. This mind/body locale began to showcase local artists' work on it's walls until four months ago, when the gallery garnered it's own space across from the studio, for the purpose of solely showing artwork. The three artists who decided to venture into this project all … [Read more...] about Octopi Gallery Mural brings Street Art Indoors
Aphrodite and the Gods of Love at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
By Rosemary Chandler BOSTON -- At the entrance of the exhibition, the marble head of Aphrodite floats in the air, as the black metal bar that secures it to its pedestal disappears against the dark wall behind it. Separated from its body centuries earlier, this is all that remains of the once life-sized statue of the beguiling Greek goddess of love and beauty. Her pensive, almond-shaped eyes gaze outwards at her spectators as they enter the latest Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, exhibition, “Aphrodite and the Gods of Love,” and her full lips turn slightly upwards in a mysterious smirk. It is an inexplicable expression akin to the infamous smile of the “Mona Lisa.” Yet unlike da Vinci’s femme fatale, Aphrodite holds no secrets, bearing all before her spectators in the impressive collection of nudes that follows. The show is a collection of 160 pieces drawn largely from the MFA’s permanent … [Read more...] about Aphrodite and the Gods of Love at Museum of Fine Arts, Boston