BUILDING A HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG Since its completion in 1949, Philip Johnson’s Glass House has captured the views of the New Canaan property in carefully curated vignettes, much as a videographer might. While the building, with its minimal structure, geometry and proportion, ushered the nomenclature of the International Style into American residential architecture, people who spend a day or an evening at The Glass House experience it first-hand as a personal paean to the natural world. Some 60-plus years later, it’s not hard to imagine Johnson and his longtime partner, David Whitney, issuing orders to groundsmen from walkie-talkies. As the property expanded from its initial five- acre parcel into the 49 acres now maintained by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, work toward creating a cohesive Edenic landscape began. Existing vernacular 18th and 19th century stone walls, … [Read more...] about Fujiko Nakaya: Veil
Issue Articles
P-Town
A CONVERSATION ABOUT PROVINCETOWN GALLERIES Provincetown, a renowned arts colony, is a safe harbor for diversity, not just for lifestyle choices, but also as a place where artists of all mediums exhibit their works. Today, there are well over 50 galleries within three miles on its two main streets, Commercial and Bradford. It’s a stunning number of venues in such a small town, giving the art scene an urban sensibility, especially on a Friday night. The range of quality is wide; abominations, mediocrity, good, great and masterworks dot the visual landscape, as would be expected in an environment where creativity on all levels is encouraged. What is also true is that excellence glows like a gemstone discovered in a rock while taking a gallery stroll. It is the spirit and skill of the artist that leaps out at the casual viewer, whether student or serious collector. Let’s take … [Read more...] about P-Town
Where Are You International
LATINO ARTISTS IN THE SPOTLIGHT For those of us living in Boston’s MetroWest region, it’s a given that for the best pupusas, or to catch a Capoeira practice, a visit to Framingham is a sure bet. The town is a known enclave of Latino businesses, from hole-in-the wall taco stands to Columbian bakeries to Brazilian ... everything. But “Latino,” this pan-ethnic label of a population predicted to claim the US majority by 2070, can be hard to pin down. To help us access the enormity of the Latino identity and the idea of “Latinization” today from an art world stand-point, enter Framingham’s Fountain Street Fine Art (FSFA). This summer, FSFA hosts the New England edition of “We Are You Project International,” a traveling exhibition of 36 contemporary Latino artists and poets with roots in over a dozen Latin American nations. Launched in 2012 by artist Raúl Villarreal … [Read more...] about Where Are You International
Painting the People
A COMMON CONVICTION; A CENTURY APART It may be difficult to consider parallelism between two artists as separated by time and tradition as Erastus Salisbury Field and Alice Neel. Yet parallelism is exactly the tenet of a groundbreaking exhibition opening July 5 at the Bennington Museum, “Alice Neel/Erastus Salisbury Field: Painting the People.” Erastus Salisbury Field was born in 1805 in Massachusetts, where he lived for most of his life. Like Alice Neel, Field found his way to Greenwich Village, where he developed his skills in portraiture. Field made his early living as a limner, but portraiture occupied the vast majority of his early and middle years. Following the death of his wife, Field returned to Massachusetts where his bucolic country life did not diminish his political fervor and passion for social justice. He was an outspoken abolitionist. “Historical … [Read more...] about Painting the People
The Empty Spaces Project
GIVING VICTIMS A VOICE A team of professional visual artists and their supporters has birthed a new project that has, in only a few months, raised a loud voice, transforming an old storefront into The Gallery on Main and launching the Empty Spaces Project with a stream of exhibitions. Leading the way is iPhonegrapher/ artist Paul J. Toussaint and his business colleague, Ann Monteiro. Their latest project brings in Giancarlo Beltrame, an interdisciplinary artist, journalist and film scholar from Italy who is the creator of the new-media installation SVAW! — an international grand project involving hundreds of contributing artists from around the world. The SVAM! 2014 Putnam project expands upon previous installations reflecting the style and structure of Beltrame’s other mobile-technology based film/installations such as “Hell,” “Purgatory” and “Paradise Now,” … [Read more...] about The Empty Spaces Project
Woodstock Pomfret, Putnam
THE QUIET CORNER MAKES SOME NOISE There is a place within “The Last Green Valley” with an endearing sobriquet: northeast Connecticut’s Quiet Corner, a quintessential New England day-trip or weekend getaway retreat for urbanites and romantics seeking seclusion from the big city. While the Quiet Corner can be remarkably dark, sometimes foggy, sleepy and atmospheric at night (and free of heavy artificial lighting and city glare), during the daytime, the mostly rural landscape, abundant in country sounds, is the nesting place of scenic towns with thriving, innovative arts communities.. U.S. Route 169, the second-longest national byway of its kind, goes through Woodstock, home of two exclusive Quiet Corner star designation points: the historic Inn at Woodstock Hill bed and breakfast (1816) and Roseland Cottage, a National Historic Landmark House Museum … [Read more...] about Woodstock Pomfret, Putnam