In a period in which America’s political, social and environmental certainties are being steadily eroded and dismantled, cutting edge art is needed more than ever to lead us to explore our feelings and hone our critical skills. Three solo exhibitions at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art (CMCA) by painter Nicole Wittenberg, sculptor Elizabeth Atterbury and installation artist Carlie Trosclair demand that the art audience steadfastly question appearances and explore our inner experience. Only with our brains fully engaged can we creatively overcome or adapt to the alarming dislocations and disruptions confronting us both at home and afar. In the lofty daylit hall abutting the entrance to the CMCA, Wittenberg’s supersized, semi-abstract oil paintings, intensely pigmented and charged with flaming orange, leap out at the viewer. Invited by CMCA curator emeritus and former director … [Read more...] about WAKE-UP CALLS IN OUR TIME

When the British illustrator Ralph Steadman came to prominence in the early 1970s, the underground press was flourishing. The wild west of ad hoc leaflets and magazines — filled with outrageous cartoons, stoned musings by hippies, yippies and zippies, and the seeds of the burgeoning self-help movement — connected the counterculture in a way comparable only to the later internet forums of the 1990s and 2000s, before the omnipresence of social media leveled both. These periodical’s illicitness and mind-expanding promises created a sprawling network that kept the in-the-know informed and the soon-to-know on a path to vulgar psychedelic enlightenment. It also made the names of the people who created and contributed to them, from Lester Bangs to the dubious Tom Forçade. While his stay in the underground pages was only a pitstop, Steadman was one of them; and even now, with awards, acclaim … [Read more...] about AND ANOTHER THING …

The New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill in Boylston, Massachusetts has been transformed into a space where botanical beauty meets historical majesty. “Chinese Empresses,” the culminating exhibition of Xiang Li's extraordinary 12-year artistic journey, brings together over 200 hand-painted portraits of Chinese imperial women, each a testament to grace, power and cultural memory. This exhibition, on view through August 24, marks the first time the collection is shown after years of partial showings at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard Museums, Worcester Art Museum and beyond. Surrounded by blooming gardens, visitors are invited into a world where history and art unfold across silk with gemstone watercolors. Xiang Li's career is as storied as the women she paints. For 37 years, she was a Master Artist at the Forbidden City in Beijing, where she restored and preserved some of … [Read more...] about TIMELESS GRACE IN BLOOM