FEATURED EXHIBITION RESONANT SPACES: SOUND ART AT DARTMOUTH HOOD DOWNTOWN 53 MAIN STREET HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE By Marguerite Serkin As a genre, sound art is still very young, even nascent in its evolution. The wide parameters defining the genre allow for breadth of interpreta- tion and representation within such a divergent range of media and thematic content to be at once idiosyncratic and profound. Curated by Spencer Topel, assistant professor of music in the Digital Musics Program at Dartmouth. and Amelia Kahl, associate curator of academic programming, “Resonant Spaces: Sound Art at Dartmouth” brings its visual and auditory subjects to life in unexpected ways. The exhibition is not limited to a single location, but is rather placed across seven venues on and around the Dartmouth College campus. The Hood Downtown Gallery, on Main Street in … [Read more...] about Hearing is Believing: Dartmouth’s Resonant Spaces Sing
November/December 2017
Love in the Air at Newport: A Sophisticated Smorgasbord
REVIEW BE OF LOVE AND OTHER STORIES: CONTEMPORARY HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PERMANENT COLLECTION NEWPORT ART MUSEUM 76 BELLEVUE AVENUE NEWPORT, RHODE ISLAND By Suzanne Volmer Newport Art Museum curator Francine Weiss chose “be of love and other stories” as the exhibition title for the current show perhaps to rec- ognize that love of art takes passion. With abundant variety, “Contemporary Highlights of the Permanent Collection” flow throughout the first and second floors of the museum’s Griswold House. The phrase “be of love” comes from an e.e.cummings poem and the words appear in a serigraph in the show by Corita Kent. This print anchors the exhi- bition for Weiss, who was delighted to learn that something by Kent was in the museum’s collection. Weiss had been impressed by the Harvard Art Museums’ exhibit “Corita Kent and the Language of Pop” in 2015. Her … [Read more...] about Love in the Air at Newport: A Sophisticated Smorgasbord
Home Sweet Home?: It’s All Relative at Art Complex
REVIEW CLOSE TO HOME ART COMPLEX MUSEUM 189 ALDEN STREET DUXBURY, MASSACHUSETTS By Suzanne Volmer Because of their tactile quality, there is often a compelling urge to touch the installations in “Close to Home,” on view through January 14, 2018, at The Art Complex Museum in Duxbury, Mass. Expertly curated by Elizabeth Michelman, the show spotlights narrative approaches by nine women artists who range from emerging to late-career talents. Women often define themselves by their relationship to home, with a sense of personal value absorbed from an intimate subculture of family and friends. This show contextualizes where and how attachments form in that trajectory of experience. As an exhibition devoted to installation art, “Close to Home” taps into childhood and adult experience. The show includes sculptural approaches, drawing, painting, photography and … [Read more...] about Home Sweet Home?: It’s All Relative at Art Complex
Migration & Memory: Revolutionary Jewish Arts in Clinton
REVIEW MIGRATION AND MEMORY: JEWISH ARTISTS OF THE RUSSIAN AND SOVIET EMPIRES MUSEUM OF RUSSIAN ICONS 203 UNION STREET CLINTON, MASSACHUSETTS By Flavia Cigliano Conceived to coincide with the cen- tennial of the Russian Revolution (1917), “Migration and Memory: Jewish Artists of the Russian and Soviet Empires” presents the work of 50 artists, predominantly Jewish, from the pre- and post-revolu- tionary eras. The exhibit was organized by Boston’s Ballets Russes Arts Initiative, and continues the Museum of Russian Icon’s ongoing public programs focusing on Russian art and culture. Anna Winestein, executive director of the Ballets Russes Arts Initiative, served as the show’s guest curator. Winestein worked closely with Vladimir and Vera Torchilin, whose personal collection was the source of all the artwork in the exhibit. When the Torchilins emigrated from … [Read more...] about Migration & Memory: Revolutionary Jewish Arts in Clinton
Dream or Nightmare?: Chinese Artists Offer Their Responses
COLLEGE SPOTLIGHT CHINESE DREAMS BAKALAR & PAINE GALLERIES MASSACHUSETTS COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN 621 HUNTINGTON AVENUE BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS By Franklin W. Liu “The visionary lies to himself; the liar only to others,” F.W. Nietzsche ominously wrote in “Human All too Human,” in 1878; fifteen years later, Mao Zedong was born in Shaoshan, Hunan Province, China. Mao would live for 83 years, leav- ing a bloody genocidal legacy and now prompting a compelling, invidi- ous exhibition, “Chinese Dreams,” — a rhetorical title for certain — cur- rently on view at MassArt’s Bakalar & Paine Galleries. “Chinese Dreams” is a collection of brave, artistic remonstrance of the “Cultural Revolution” — a decade-long, unrelenting hardship from 1966 to 1976 — imposed by Chairman Mao Zedong on ordinary citizens; the end result was millions of people suffering and … [Read more...] about Dream or Nightmare?: Chinese Artists Offer Their Responses
Capsule Previews Nov/Dec 2017
By Brian Goslow With approximately 30 mem- bers, New England Wax’s mis- sion is “to promote excellence in fine art made with encaustic” through professional, juried exhi- bitions. “Shifts: Approaching Encaustic from All Angles,” on view through November 26 at the Fuller Craft Museum, 455 Oak St., Brockton, Mass., was curated by Dedee Shattuck Gallery chief curator Ben Shattuck. “No other medium has as much ver- satility as encaustic, which can encompass two dimensions with depth via its translucency and a build-up of layers, or sculpted and altered while still warm.” “Inner Beauty,” an exhibition of works by AJ Oishi and Jung Hur, continues through November 27 at Gallery BOM, 460 Harrison Ave. B-7, Boston. Oishi’s multicol- ored circular designs, which reveal a relaxingly endless intensity the more you look at them, are created with the eraser side of a #2 pencil and a … [Read more...] about Capsule Previews Nov/Dec 2017