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Artscope Magazine | January/February 2021

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Massachusetts

BEST OF ONLINE SHOWS: NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN ARTISTS MASSACHUSETTS CHAPTER’S “FLOATING DREAMS” STRIKES A CHORD

// Artscope Online, Exhibits, Visual Arts

by Hannah Carrigan

One of four current National Association of Women Artists Massachusetts Chapter (NAWA MA) online exhibitions, “Floating Dreams” is poignant and peaceful — a welcome invitation to reflect and an engaging collection of works. The show explores, in tandem, the realms of the subconscious mind and the physical, tactile world. Full of pieces that one might not immediately associate with its theme, “Floating Dreams” challenges viewers to stay present and inquisitive among each contributing artists’ work. And this seems to be exactly what “Floating Dreams” is about: leaving ample space for interpretation; implying the slightly fantastical or subtly surreal; and allowing us to access our inner dreams, constant within us though scarcely recognized. In viewing the exhibition as a whole, the inspirational force of the natural world becomes clear. A few works feature obvious representations of … [Read more...] about BEST OF ONLINE SHOWS: NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF WOMEN ARTISTS MASSACHUSETTS CHAPTER’S “FLOATING DREAMS” STRIKES A CHORD

“A HORSE WALKS INTO A BAR” AND OTHER CURIOUS NOTIONS AT HAMPDEN GALLERY

// Artscope Online, Current Exhibits, Visual Arts

by Hannah Carrigan

D. Dominick Lombardi’s curation of whit is unmistakable. In a fine arts show at UMassAmherst’s Hampden Gallery featuring works by 26 artists, and with a theme as broad as humor, cohesiveness is not a given. And yet, while “A Horse Walks into a Bar” contains a myriad of mediums and styles, its parts come together to form a wonderfully silly, provocative and subtly nostalgic whole. Perhaps the most exciting aspect of “A Horse Walks Into A Bar” is the innovative and unique use of materials and methods to achieve a sense of playfulness and absurdity. Among the most intriguing of these is Lucy White’s Band-Aid prints, “Sex Pistols,” 2005, “Peace Panty,” 2006, and “I Hate You Brief  XL,” 2006. In her signature minimalist style, with an edge of art-poking-fun-at-art, White offers viewers an easy avenue into weighty issues like gender inequality and gun violence. Other exciting uses of … [Read more...] about “A HORSE WALKS INTO A BAR” AND OTHER CURIOUS NOTIONS AT HAMPDEN GALLERY

Evan Turissini, Paul Melendy, David Keohane and Debra Wise (Photograph by Nile Scott Studios).

VANITY FAIR, AN (IM-)MORALITY PLAY AT CENTRAL SQUARE THEATER

// Artscope Online, Review, Theatre

by James Foritano

For my money, the Underground Railway Theater’s presentation of “Vanity Fair, An (Im-)Morality Play,” at Central Square Theater through February 23, couldn’t be a more timely and engaging burlesque of the surplus of hypocrisy and disguised cruelty that runs just below even the most distinguished of civilizations. In this case, the narrative is based on novelist William Makepeace Thackery’s mid-19th century novel, “Vanity Fair," which, judging from this dramatic adaptation, looked minutely and scathingly at an England nearing the height of an empire so globally broad that upon it, “the sun never sets.” The directing and the acting were, in this reviewer’s perception, superb. It was a delight to see hypocrisy so fully inflated with its own pomposity it seemed to float like a gas-filled balloon across the narrow stage with only its tiny, well-shod feet showing — the more pleasure to … [Read more...] about VANITY FAIR, AN (IM-)MORALITY PLAY AT CENTRAL SQUARE THEATER

All Artists, All Abilities: “TechnoGateway” at Gateway Arts Center

// Artscope Online, Current Exhibits, Exhibits, Visual Arts

by Olivia MacDonald

Art is a process, a feeling, a place where peace, hope, expression, safety, and purpose live. While kneading thick clay, melting paint into blank canvases, and drawing new shapes on an iPad, over 100 students at Gateway Arts Center in Brookline, Massachusetts call art home. Each of these artists has a disability, but holds a different story within themselves that they use art to convey. The center’s current exhibit titled “TechnoGateway,” based on artwork created or inspired by technology, fills the walls with imaginative creatures and bright color. In Darryl Richard’s Untitled acrylic on canvas piece, a cartoon pear holds a “rock on” sign, a hot dog carries a boom box, and an onion raises a walker above its head in the center, amongst other food part of the crowd. Each piece of food has its own personality and the vibrant color creates energy and movement within the piece. For … [Read more...] about All Artists, All Abilities: “TechnoGateway” at Gateway Arts Center

LOCAL ECOLOGIES AS ART: UNIVERSITY GALLERIES INSPIRE TIMELY DISCUSSION

// Artscope Online, Exhibits, Featured, Featured, September/October 2019, Visual Arts

by Ron Fortier

“Local Ecologies,” which will be exhibited at three University of Massachusetts institution galleries during the 2019-20 school year, features commission artworks by artists who have lived and worked in eastern Massachusetts. The traveling exhibition was organized by Kirsten Swenson, an associate professor and art history coordinator at UMass Lowell; Sam Toabe, gallery director at UMass Boston; and art historian and curator Rebecca Uchill, a full-time lecturer in art education, art history and media studies at UMass Dartmouth. Onsite curators are Toabe at UMass Boston; Uchill and University Art Gallery director Viera Levitt at UMass Dartmouth; and Swenson and University Gallery coordinator Deborah Santoro at UMass Lowell. “I am excited to work with UMass Dartmouth art history professor Rebecca Uchill and other partners on the exhibition “Local Ecologies” that is bridging the … [Read more...] about LOCAL ECOLOGIES AS ART: UNIVERSITY GALLERIES INSPIRE TIMELY DISCUSSION

LIFE’S DECISIVE MOMENTS: MALEK CELEBRATES PEOPLE AT WORK

// Artscope Online, Current Issue, Exhibits, Featured, September/October 2019

by Marguerite Serkin

Photographer Tad Malek knows a bit about patience. With a background in color landscape photography, Malek has spent full days immersed in natural surroundings, waiting for the perfect still. Malek’s current exhibition, “People at Work and Other Environmental Portraits,” on view at Springfield Museums, marks a departure from the restraint of waiting for that consummate shot into the realm of portraiture in the moment, with all its alluring fallibility and epiphanic fulfillment. Choosing almost exclusively black-and-white images for “People at Work and Other Environmental Portraits,” Malek has deliberately shifted media to capture the rich textures and nuanced variations within each piece. Sharp exposure delineates the finest detail, whether it be the lines along the walkway of the “Brooklyn Bridge Lady in the Shade,” 2008; the sculpted musculature of a male bather in “Rio de Janeiro … [Read more...] about LIFE’S DECISIVE MOMENTS: MALEK CELEBRATES PEOPLE AT WORK