artscope magazine
Full of Agency.
March 31, 2011
Greetings!

If you've been looking for inspiration, school is the place to find it. Three different schools featured in this blast! are hosting influential exhibits packed with power that are sure to make your jaw drop and your head spin. Also, don't forget to check out our new blog on the artscope website. It is equipped with updated headlines and rotating featured content -- a great way to stay connected to art and culture news in between artscope issues and email blasts!

As always, you can send information on upcoming exhibitions and performance events for both the magazine and these e-mail blasts to [email protected]; reach us to advertise.

To forward this blast, please use the link provided at the end of this email - Lacey Daley

The Alchemy of Design at Hood Museum of Art
in Hanover, New Hampshire April 9th through May 29th


Blue Divide by Esm� Thompson, 2005, forty-nine piece installation, acrylic on tin. Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College: Purchased through the William S. Rubin Fund; 2008.11

Experiments, infusions, and intersections all run the risk of introducing new elements into pre-existing conditions. These risks pay off when a sort of organic growth occurs, drawing the eyes, heart, and mind into a state of tangible bliss. Esm� Thompson experiments in decorative designs in a handful of different media, including drawings, collages, paintings, and installations. Reflections and patterns of the natural world are echoed in Thompson's work, which incorporates techniques of her many influences, distinguishing a style that is all her own. In doing this, Thompson has constructed a visual narrative to depict the patterns, shapes, and structures of nature. The Hood Museum of Art at Dartmouth College is hosting Esm� Thompson: The Alchemy of Design. The approximately thirty works featured in the show reveal Thompson's influences of Renaissance portraits, Moroccan textiles, wall painting, ceramics, medieval illuminated manuscripts, and biological illustrations and photographs. In Blue Divide, the installation spotlighted in the image above, Thompson painted patterns on galvanized tin covers of maple syrup buckets. She then played with settings of arrangement, connecting with the piece's mutable qualities. Of this installation and others like it, Thompson writes: "Over the past ten years, my interest in creating an interactive visual narrative resulted in the creation of multiple-panel pieces in which the relationship of the parts to the whole is fundamental . . . I respond to the sight of the buckets hanging, solitary, on trees, reminding me of the transitional and ephemeral nature of the seasons as well as the resurgence of new life." In a variety of wall arrangements, Thompson creates a natural discourse that is existent due to her constant experiments with language, symbols, and their overlap. Esm� Thompson: The Alchemy of Design runs from April 9th through May 29th. Thompson herself, who is a professor of Studio Art at Dartmouth College, will give an opening lecture on Friday, April 15th at 5:30pm. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue, with essays by medieval studies scholar Marjorie Woods and artist and ceramicist Liz Quackenbush, as well as an interview with the artist.

Sponsored by: Bromfield Gallery, New Art Center, and Fountain Street Open Studios



Bromfield Gallery


Nancy Diessner: "Shelter In Place"


Vivian Pratt: "Ephemeral Memorials"


March 30 - April 30, 2011
Opening reception: Friday, April 1, 6-8:30
Open Wednesday - Saturday 12 - 5

450 Harrison Ave
Boston, MA 02026
www.bromfieldgallery.com
617-451-3605

New Art Center



Artists and Curators: New Art Center in Newton
is accepting proposals for group exhibitions.
No restrictions on content, medium, or theme.
Selected curators receive $1,000.
Deadline: April 11, 2011.
For guidelines and info: www.newartcenter.org/artist/opportunity

Concepts in Glass runs April 11 - May 15, 2011,
an exhibition which explores glass as a conceptual medium.
www.newartcenter.org

Behind the Veil at Brodigan Gallery
in Groton, Massachusetts April 11th through May 20th


Kabul, Afghanistan - Feb 8, 2005 by Paula Lerner.

The news media constantly fixes our attention on the destructions and devastations of war that are affecting Afghanistan day after day. We've seen the irreparable damage, the death, and the wounded, but rarely are we granted a window that shows how the natives of this country are attempting to rebuild their lives. Award winning photographer and multimedia producer Paula Lerner lifts up the blinds of this window in her series of photographs that capture the daily routines of Afghan people. Lerner first traveled to Afghanistan in 2005 as a member of the non-profit organization, the Business Council for Peace. The mission of this group is to help grow and expand the skills, businesses, and economic power of women. While there, Lerner connected with the impoverished women of Kabul and Kandahar. She witnessed what went on behind closed doors and decided to document it and share it with the world. In her work we see instances of laughter, joy, bonding, childhood, and relationships--universal subjects that conflict with the images of war, universal subjects that can resonate with almost anyone. By exposing the commonalities of the everyday lives of these women, Lerner has opened a portal of identity that aligns almost effortlessly with art. Through her photographs, Lerner hopes people can develop a human connection with these women. Of this Afghanistan series, Lerner says, "My aim is to put a human face on those who were previously invisible and offer a voice where there has been only silence." Brodigan Gallery at Groton School is hosting this powerful exhibit. Behind the Veil: An Intimate Journey into the Lives of Kandahar's Women by Paula Lerner opens on Monday, April 11th and runs through Friday, May 20th. Come be educated on the inner habits on Afghan life and connect with these women that, up until this point, you have only read about.

Family Portraits at Foster Gallery
in Dedham, Massachusetts now through April 22nd


        Untitled (Coast of Mount Desert Island) by Cobi Moules, 2010. Oil, 44"x 68"

Family and familial discourse is a fluid, ever-changing concept that constantly redefines itself, its morals, and its messages. The idea of a family portrait is an attempt to capture this fluidity of structure, roles, and values in a static frame to tell the stories within it. Evelyn Rydz, a recent finalist for the 2010 James and Audrey Foster Prize awarded by the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, has brought together the works of seven artists in the Foster Gallery at Noble and Greenough School to explore this discourse of family and perhaps even create a new one. "A family portrait is a visual account of each family's dynamic world and the systems, roles, relationships and stories that are part of them," says Rydz. "Through staging, altering, and reinventing, the artists in this exhibition investigate themes of family and identity. These works play with the boundaries and assumptions that typically define this familiar piece of our collective culture." The seven featured artists-Christine Rogers, Cobi Moules, Hannah Barrett, Megan & Murray McMillan, Dustin Williams, and Tanit Sakakini-bring a variety of different media to the exhibit, including studio portraits, paintings, drawings, filmed performances, and collages. As a whole, Family Portraits explores common and uncommon narratives, relations and relationships, habits, actions, politics, androgyny, and gender roles. The merging and collaboration of all these themes within one gallery makes for a dynamic exhibit that encourages us to think outside of our boundaries of comfort. The show itself will be on view now through April 22nd in the Foster Gallery, where all shows are free and open to the public. A reception with the exhibition's curator, Evelyn Rydz, and the gifted artists will take place on Friday, April 8th from 6-8pm. Bring your family and share with them this experience of family relations and identity matters.

Fountain Street Open Studios


Friday, April 8, 5:30-9PM
Saturday, April 9 & Sunday, April 10, 11AM-5PM
50+ Participating Artists
Painting, Drawing, Mixed Media, Photography, Sculpture, Jewelry, Printmaking & more! FountainStreetStudios.com
59 Fountain St, Framingham, MA

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Lacey Daley
artscope
phone: 617-639-5771