ArtSake

We compile a monthly list of presentations, honors, publications, and events featuring past and present MCC Artist Fellows & Finalists. As you’ll see, the news is good - not just about these award-winning artists, but also about the breadth and vitality of contemporary arts throughout the Commonwealth.

SIX past and current MCC Artist Fellows were selected to be among nine finalists for the 2010 James and Audrey Foster Prize, the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston’s biennial award and exhibition program for Boston-area artists. Eirik Johnson (Photography Fellow ‘09), Fred H. C. Liang (Painting Fellow ‘04, ‘08), Rebecca Meyers (Film & Video Fellow ‘09), Matt Rich (Painting Fellow ‘10), Evelyn Rydz (Drawing Fellow ‘10), and Steve Tourlentes (Photography Fellow ‘05), along with Robert de Saint Phalle, Daniela Rivera, and Amie Siegel, will participate in an exhibition at the ICA that opens Sept. 22, 2010, and continues through Jan. 30, 2011. The winner of the prize will be announced in January 2011.

Three MCC Fellows are featured in the show 1X1 at Gallery Kayafas in Boston. The show, curated by Gregory Mencoff (Sculpture/Installation Fellow ‘05, ‘09), includes work by Evelyn Rydz (Drawing Fellow ‘10) and Pat Shannon (Sculpture/Installation Fellow ‘09) along with Nancy Cusack and John Schulz. It runs March 4-April 10, 2010, with receptions on First Fridays: March 5 and April 2, 5:30-8 PM.

Three MCC Fellows/Finalists are featured in an exhibition of Artadia Boston’s recent awardees, at the Mills Gallery in the Boston Center for the Arts. Work by Claire Beckett (Photography Fellow ‘07), Ambreen Butt (Drawing Finalist ‘10), and Eric Gottesman (Photography Fellow ‘09), along with that of Caleb Cole, Raúl González, Amie Siegel and Joe Zane, will on exhibit March 26 - April 25, 2010, opening reception, Friday, March 26, 6-8 PM.

Speaking of Claire Beckett… kudos to Claire and Irina Rozovsky (Photography Finalist ‘09): both are included in the Humble Arts Foundation’s 31 Women in Art Photography, which is on exhibit at Affirmation Arts in NYC, March 6-April 10, 2010, opening reception: Saturday, March 6, 6–9 PM.

This month, Steve Almond (Fiction/Creative Nonfiction Fellow ‘08) has a number of Boston-area readings and appearances in advance of the April release his new book Rock and Roll Will Save Your Life. On Friday, March 12, he’ll be the host of Grub Street’s Grub Gone… Blue, a night of reading from writers’ “blue” periods. On Thursday, March 18, he’ll join Steven Beeber at the Art Institute of Boston (check back at Steve’s website for details). On Tuesday, March 23, he’ll join Keith Morris at Porter Square Books in Cambridge. Then on April 16, his voice by now limbered up and the mic cleared of sibilance, he’ll visit the Brattle Theatre (hosted by Harvard Bookstore) for a musical celebration of his new book, an ode/confessional for the musical superfan in all of us. Tickets on sale now. In other auspicious Almond news: his story “Donkey Greedy, Donkey Gets Punched” has been selected by Richard Russo to appear in The Best American Short Stories 2010. Can I humbly request a “Woo hoo?”

Alissa Cardone (Choreography Finalist ‘02, ‘06, ‘08) and Kinodance will perform their new work “Fuse” on March 5 as part of the 12th biennial Arts and Technology Symposium at Connecticut College.

Ralf Yusuf Gawlick (Music Composition Fellow ‘09) let us know that on March 17 at 8 pm in Gasson Hall, Boston College, the Hawthorne String Quartet will perform his Berlin Suite. The piece, performed here as a concert suite, was commissioned by the German Embassy and Boston College for the film documentary “Writing on the Wall: Remembering the Berlin Wall” celebrating the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Admission is free. At 7 PM, there is a reception to celebrate the release of Solo and Chamber Works, Ralf Yusuf Gawlick, from Musica Omnia. Also, don’t miss the premiere of Kinderkreuzzug, Ralf’s dramatic cantata for children’s voices and small chamber ensemble, on Saturday, April 10, 7:30 PM, at St. Ignatius, Chestnut Hill and again on Sunday, April 11, 3:00 PM Trinity Episcopal, Concord. The cantata, which adapts Bertolt Brecht’s extraordinary and grim anti-war poetry, will be performed by two New England choirs and a German boys choir sponsored to fly to the region specifically for this piece. The choirs will record the cantata for the label Musica Omnia.

Masako Kamiya (Painting Fellow ‘06, ‘10) has a solo exhibition, Outspoken: Masako Kamiya, 2002-2010 at the Danforth Museum of Art in Framingham, March 17 - May 16 2010. Artist’s Reception: Saturday, March 20, 6-8PM. Artist’s Talk: Wednesday, March 17, noon & Sunday, April 11, 3PM. (The talks are free for museum members or with paid admission to the museum.) Read more about the show (and about Masako) on ArtSake.

Adam Lampton (Photography Finalist ‘07) has a solo show at Carroll and Sons Gallery in Boston, Nothing Serious Can Happen Here: Photographs from Macao by Adam Lampton. The show runs through March 27, 2010.

Todd McKie (Painting Finalist ‘08) has been awarded a Residency Fellowship to Instituto Sacatar in Bahia, Brazil. Twenty-five artists were selected from among more than 500 candidates from 19 different countries. Todd will be there for two months in 2011. You can see recent work by Todd at Gallery NAGA in Boston this May 2010. A book about a collaborative project done with David Caras is to be published to coincide with the exhibition.

This month, work by Nathalie Miebach (Sculpture/Installation Fellow ‘09) can be experienced both locally and in NYC, and through numerous senses. Her sculptural art, recently featured at the Sarah Doyle Gallery at Brown University, is now on exhibit in 185th Annual Invitational Exhibition of Contemporary American Art, National Academy Museum, New York, NY, through June 8, 2010. Furthermore, she’s in a group show called Transformations in the Jewett Gallery at Wellesley College, March 3-April 4, with an opening reception March 4, 5-6 PM. Then on March 14, at 3 PM, the Axis Ensemble will perform her sculptures (not a typo) at the Lily Pad in Inman Square, Cambridge. Nathalie creates her fascinating sculptures using weather data; for this project, she’s translating the weather data into musical scores, then using the score as a starting point for her sculpture. MEANWHILE, the score itself goes to musicians (enter the Axis Ensemble), and voila, you have “Hurricane Noel,” a performance and sculpture interpreting the same weather. We have it on good authority that the sculpture will be in attendance at the concert.

Stephen Mishol (Painting Fellow ‘08) has three paintings and four drawings in Tek’tanik at the Aferro Gallery in Newark, NJ. The show runs from March 13 - April 24.

Eric Henry Sanders (Playwriting Fellow ‘09) will have a workshop reading of his play Woyzeck: Homecoming at The Drilling Company in NYC in March. Then in April, his short play Dead Duck will be part of the Back to Back Director’s Project, starting April 21, 2010 at Available Potential Enterprises.

Past Fellows Notes
Feb. 2010
Jan. 2010

Are you a past fellow or finalist with an event, honor, or other bit of news you’d like to share? Tell us about it.

Image: Eirik Johnson, THE ROAD TO FORKS, WASHINGTON (2006), archival pigment print, 24×30 in; Cover art for SOLO AND CHAMBER WORKS, RALF YUSUF GAWLICK (Musica Omnia 2010); Stephen Mishol, PUSH (2007) Vinyl paint on paper, 20×25 3/4 in.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Congratutions to Sand T on her 2009 New England Art Award victory as the People’s Choice for Best Standout Work by a Local Artist in a Group Show as organized by the New England Journal of Aesthetic Research. ArtSake recently caught up with artist Sand T and she has graciously agreed to let us take a peek in her studio and talk to us about her work.

The primary intention of this body of non-objective work is to create a simple visual experience utilizing the basic elements of dot, line, color, surface and light. I feel the pieces suggest concepts of time, concentration, and the meditative energies of motion. The reductive aesthetic in my work is an overlapping of decidedly contrary visual elements: fluidity vs. structural, opacity vs. transparency, and formalistic vs. introspective.

I use a combination of UV resistant industrial epoxy resin, graphite, and paint on archival tempered clayboard or acrylic glass panels. The lines are drawn using graphite in varying weights and grades. Resin droplets are placed on the final surface one at a time. The placement of these two elements is sometimes improvised, sometimes planned until a “visual plane” emerges.

Though my process is time consuming and labor intensive, working with resin and acrylic glass provides a balance of structure and chaos that is fulfilling to me. It challenges my affinity for problem solving, material sensitivity, time management and organizational skills. Lighting plays an important role in the presentation of my work for it maximizes the viewing experience. When the viewer moves from one side to another of the artwork, they will see a sequence of reflections in the work. Clearly, there is more to be mined from the work when seen in person.

A huge challenge for viewers is to not touch the work. The physical properties of these tactile art objects fill viewers with an almost irresistible urge to touch them. The glistening, shining surfaces give them an appearance of being wet with beaded water.

Photographing this series of work is a challenge for me. The glossy surface and the intricate visual details innate in my art objects are hard to capture with any accuracy. The source, brightness and angle of the lighting changes the appearance of the object. These fine details are usually not noticeable or distinctive in any image reproductions. Since accurate reproduction is very difficult, I invite interested persons to view the original creations at my studio or art exhibit. What could be more satisfying than being able to appreciate a piece of original work of art up close in person?

So with that said, I would like to invite you to a reception to be held at Grimshaw-Gudewicz Art Gallery in Bristol Community College in Fall River on Thursday, March 11, 2010, from 6-8pm. This joint exhibition, Linear, is curated by Kathleen Hancock and features the works by three regional artists. Exhibition Dates: March 11 - April 7, 2010. For more info, please visit Grimshaw-Gudewicz Art Gallery’s Web site. To learn more about my work, please visit my Web site.

Image credit: All images courtesy of Sand T. Image captions: Image 1, 2 and 3: In progress… I am getting ready these panels for my show at Grimshaw-Gudewicz Art Gallery this March-April. Panels’ dimensions: 42×42x3.5”and 46×46 x3.5”. Image 4: Packing time. Image 5 and 6 : Work on display in my open storage in Malden, Massachusetts.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

The 2010 MCC Artist Fellowship awards have been selected for Painting, Drawing and Traditional Arts. Applications for the MCC’s Artist Fellowship Program were open to all eligible Massachusetts artists.

A total number of 776 applications were received; 488 in Painting, 266 in Drawing and 22 in Traditional Arts. Get a complete list of this year’s fellows and finalists in these disciplines.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Remember when we told you about Harvard Bookstore in Cambridge and its new book machine, which prints paperback books while you wait, including books by self-publishing authors?

Steve Almond (Fiction/Creative Nonfiction Fellow ‘08) is about to give a working demonstration.

On Wednesday, December 2, 7 PM at Harvard Square Bookstore in Cambridge, he’s going to do something he’s pretty sure has never been done before (and we’re pretty sure he’s right). He’ll read from a book you can then have published before your very eyes (via the bookstore’s book machine). You can even have editorial control over the cover (he says there will be several designs to choose from), and possibly even the size of the trim.

The book is called This Won’t Take But a Minute, Honey. Read one way, it includes 30 short short stories. Flipped over and read the opposite way, you can read Steve’s brief essays on writing.

Also, Steve (along with Harvard’s print-on-demand manager Bronwen Blaney) will discuss the changing landscape of publishing and why Steve chose to make a book this way.

In other words, the event should be interesting in about a dozen ways (if you’ve ever experienced a Steve Almond reading, you know his singular humor accounts for at least 11).

To see what other past MCC Fellows and Finalists are up to, check out our Fellows Notes.

Images: cover art (front and back) for Steve Almond’s THIS WON’T TAKE BUT A MINUTE, HONEY. Illustrations by artist Brian Stauffer.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

It’s been 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and a group of Boston-area filmmakers and artists are exploring the event - both its tumultuous history and the individual stories of people caught up in it - in Writing on the Wall. The film premieres this Sunday, October 11, 4:30 PM, at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston.

The film is directed by Boston College professor John J. Michalczyk and was produced in conjunction with Boston College and the Germany Embassy in Washington D.C.

We’re especially excited by the news that Ralf Yusuf Gawlick, an MCC Music Composition Fellow in 2009, was commissioned to write the musical score, which was performed by the Boston-based Hawthorne String Quartet.

To read other news from MCC Artist Fellows and Finalists, check out Fellows Notes.

Image: Promotional image from WRITING ON THE WALL, a film by John J. Michalczyk. Click the image to learn more about the premiere at the MFA Boston.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

We’ve raked together a big, beautiful pile of autumnal good news, featuring fellows and finalists from our Artist Fellowships Program, including…

• Laura Chasman’s portrait NICHOLAS (above) has been selected for an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery
• Michael Downing reads from his new memoir at Porter Square Books
• Brian Knep fuses art, science, and hundreds of small, odd creatures in Exempla at the Tufts Art Gallery
• A solo show by Andrew Mowbray launches the PLATFORM series at the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum

Read the Fellows Notes.

Image: Laura Chasman, NICHOLAS (2008), gouache on illustration board, 12×11 in; Brian Knep, EXPAND (2008), interactive video installation, computer, video projector, custom software, light switch, 5×7 ft

Powered by Bookmarkify™

We’ve updated our Fellows Notes for August, a timely roundup of the shows, publications, and other assorted good news of MCC Artist Fellows/Finalists.

This month’s Noted include Stockbridge dance artist Dawn Lane (Choreography Finalist ‘08), who was featured in a great article by Abigail Wood in the Berkshire Eagle. The story talks about Dawn’s choreography and about the integral work she’s doing in arts access.

“Dawn is all about bringing people together and creating a sense of community,” said [Ella] Baff [executive director at Jacob's Pillow]. “And she brings all of her vast choreographic skills — because she is a very, very highly trained dancer and dance maker — and she brings all of those skills to a mission, and the mission is inclusiveness.”

Read the full article.

While we’re on the subject of dance: The Disappearing Woman, a collaborative media and movement piece by Nell Breyer (Choreography Fellow ‘06), Alissa Cardone, Lorraine Chapman, and Bronwen MacArthur (Choreography Finalists ‘08) runs July 30-August 3 at the Daniel Arts Center, Bard College at Simon’s Rock, as part of Berkshire Fringe. The Disappearing Woman blends Nell’s fascinating new media creations (which you can see examples of here) with captivating choreography.

Also this weekend, the 11th annual Roxbury Film Festival screens at venues throughout the Boston area. On Saturday, August 1, 1 PM, as part of the Roxbury Shorts Program, Alla Kovgan’s (Film & Video Fellow ‘09) film Nora screens at the MFA Boston. The film dramatizes the life of Nora Chipaumire through dance and stunning visual storytelling.

Read the Fellows Notes.

Image: Still from FOR HEAVENS SAKE (2005), choreography by Dawn Lane; Nora Chipaumire, from NORA (2008), co-directed by Alla Kovgan and David Hinton. Click images to see video clips.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

We’ve posted the July installment of Fellows Notes, a page that, like the space-saving desk pictured above, is densely packed with intriguing stuff.

This month’s current news from past MCC fellows and finalists includes Peggy Diggs, Colleen Kiely, and Lisa Olstein, plus info on group shows featuring an almost unfathomable number (well, 17) of past fellows/finalists.

And while you’re feeling newsy, check out the equally packed June Fellows Notes.

Image: Peggy Diggs (Drawing Fellow ‘02, Sculpture/Installation Fellow ‘07), WORKOUT (RED) (2006) cardboard, paint, hardware 31 in x 55 in x 15 1/2 in. Pieces from Peggy’s WorkOut series are featured in Gaia and Global Warming: Women Artists Champion Nature at the Center for the Arts in Jackson, Wyoming, through September 28.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

Go here for exciting words strung together meaningfully conveying the sensational honors, events, and news of past fellows and finalists from our Artist Fellowship Program.

In other (fewer) words: read the latest Fellows Notes.

Powered by Bookmarkify™

In honor of this past Saturday’s Earth Hour, I thought I’d round up a handful of shows/calls for artists centered on the environment, green-ness, and/or where we’re headed as an Earth.

Salem Arts Association, in collaboration with the Marblehead Arts Association, has announced a call for art for The Green Show: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, deadline tomorrow, March 31. The Green Show theme creates an opportunity for artists to express different aspects of nature, and the environment, representing nature at its best, that which is detrimental to nature and the environment, and artwork using recycled materials and found objects. The exhibit will run from Saturday, April 4 through Sunday, April 26. More information.

The Somerville Arts Council is seeking craft vendor applications, talent applications, and community vendor applications for ArtBeat, held on July 17 & 18, 2009 throughout Davis Square in Somerville. This year’s theme is: What will Somerville look like in ten years? One hundred years? A million years? Among the possibilities, of course, is future-Somerville through an environmental lens, but the main thing is that all proposals “boldly should go where no one has gone before!” Deadlines and more info here.

Two past MCC Artist Fellows, Jane D. Marsching (Photography Fellow ‘99) and Deb Todd Wheeler (Sculpture/Installation Fellow ‘03), have work in Near Everywhere, which opened last week at GASP (Gallery Artists Studio Projects) in Brookline. The show features the work of Jane and Deb alongside art by Ellen Driscoll, Marguerite Kahrl, Troy David Ouellete, Adriane Coburn, and Vivan Sundaram. The show runs through May 2.

As curator Ellen Driscoll puts it: “Near Everywhere encourages us to awaken to the daily details around us that remind us that ‘everything we need is already here.’”

To read what other past fellows/finalists are up to, check out the latest Fellows Notes.

Powered by Bookmarkify™