Article Excerpts: Welcome | Cornered: Hope M. Ricciardi of United South End Artists | Featured Museum: First Light at ICA/Boston | Michaels and Avery at Bennington: Making Their Own Rules | Ratté's Circle of Life: All That Glitters... | Grashow Makes the Cut: A Retrospective in Wood and Cardboard | Brewster's Quixotic Encounters: A Movement and a Region Evolve | Tayo Heuser's Spiritual Force: Looking In: Looking Out in Jamestown | Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty: Ode to a Modern Master's Legacy | Unbound in Portland: The Kids Are Jammin' | Feminine Influence: NAWA at Endicott | Chroma at Montserrat: New England Art Awakens | 2016 Biennial at Fuller Craft: Resplendent In Divergence | Provincetown's In Autumn: A Cornucopia of Art | Eggert at T+H Gallery: A Moving Commentary | Reindorf at Galatea: Man vs. Nature | Safarani Sisters at Adelson: Uncovering the Mystery | Building … [Read more...] about September/October 2016
September/October 2016
Safarani Sisters at Adelson
Uncovering the Mystery by Kristin Wissler From a young age, Farzaneh and Bahareh Safarani, better known as the Safarani Sisters, were enamored with the arts. Growing up in Iran, the twin sisters spent all their free time drawing and painting. While they took swimming, volleyball and gymnastics lessons, the real fun for them was coming home afterwards and drawing. By age five, they knew they wanted to be artists, and at age 13 they met and began learning from Iranian artist Farimah Farhatnia. They went on to study art at Tehran University, majoring in painting, but also taking classes in music, theatre, dance, poetry and other art forms. They went on to Northeastern University to pursue their MFAs in studio art, a joint program between Northeastern and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, both in Boston. In May of this year, I covered the Safarani Sisters’ MFA Thesis … [Read more...] about Safarani Sisters at Adelson
Reindorf at Galatea
Man Vs. Nature by Joshua Ascherman Lisa Reindorf is no stranger to political art; she’s received acclaim for a series of gesturally painted panels depicting the expansion of Syrian refugee camps as seen from the air. This October, in a show at Galatea Fine Art in Boston’s SoWa District called “Building Into Water,” the artist tackles another vital political issue: the environment. The great tension in Reindorf’s paintings is between human and nature; it’s a dichotomy that isn’t novel but into which she breathes new life. For her, the natural systems that have been disturbed by the expansion of man-made infrastructure are not passive — rather, they apply their own counter-pressure to human society in response to disturbances. Reindorf’s work aims to represent this tug-of-war. This is indeed true in the case of the paintings that will show in “Building into Water.” They … [Read more...] about Reindorf at Galatea
Unbound in Portland
The Kids are Jammin' by Taryn Plumb When Tim Rollins arrived in the Bronx as a 26-year-old in the early ‘80s, it was, as he describes, “on fire” — literally, of course, due to the conflagrations that consumed the borough for an entire decade, but also culturally. It was an electric, inspiring and frightening backdrop for what would ultimately become his life’s work. After growing up in rural Maine and attending the University of Maine in Augusta, he was recruited to “the toughest ghetto in America,” as he described it, to develop a curriculum fusing art, reading and writing for “at risk” youth. What eventually resulted was the group “Kids of Survival” (K.O.S.), which over time morphed into a traveling workshop that has produced art for prestigious museums and exhibits all over the world. This fall, Tim Rollins and K.O.S. are bringing their unique and inspiring … [Read more...] about Unbound in Portland
Michals and Avery at Bennington
Making Their Own Rules by Marguerite Serkin DUANE MICHALS Duane Michals has never played by the rules. Almost exclusively self-taught, his storied approach to photog-raphy has grown out of years, now decades, of hard work and experience. On view at the Bennington Museum, “Duane Michals: Photographs from the Floating World” represents the photographer’s more recent work, from 2005 to the present. “A great wave of melancholy swept over Tanya” portrays a young woman in traditional Japanese garb, appearing in sharp deꔀnition against the softer focus of the trees and brook behind her. By contrast, in “Vincent Van Gogh,” sun똀owers dominate, with an almost incidental ꔀgure carrying a ladder, making his way among the blooms. This balance and counterbalance between human form and natural surroundings invite the viewer to look more closely, drawn in by the artist’s riveting … [Read more...] about Michals and Avery at Bennington