On Mass Cultural Council's Power of Culture blog, multimedia artist Erin Genia, an enrolled member of the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate and a Mass Cultural Council Outreach Coordinator, wrote an intriguing post about institutional barriers to supporting Native American and indigenous artists. One of the primary barriers is captured in this question: "How are arts and culture … [Read more...]
Artist Voices
Highlighting the work and voices of individual artists.
Learning to Be Auntie’s Baby
Artists Simone John (Poetry Fellow '20) (aka Simone Ivory) and flowerthief (one half of the music duo Optic Bloom) collaborated to create the audio poetry project, Auntie's Baby. Auntie's Baby draws on the artists' multidisciplinary background, using family phone calls, poetry, music, and sound to "open a portal into Black storytelling." Recently, Simone and flowerthief … [Read more...]
Stress and Burnout as an Artist
Periodically, we pose questions about issues artists face in their work and lives. This month, we wanted to revisit a question we first posed in 2018, How do you deal with stress and burnout, as an artist? Artists Clint Baclawski, Tsar Fedorsky, Marilyn Pappas, Jessica Rizkallah, and Debra Weisberg respond. Marilyn Pappas, textile artist For more years than I care to … [Read more...]
Heather Kamins, Author of The Moth Girl
On March 8, 2022, 7 PM ET, Heather Kamins (Fiction/Creative Nonfiction Fellow '16) has a virtual book launch event for her young adult novel The Moth Girl (G.P. Putnam's Sons Books 2022), hosted by Odyssey Books in South Hadley. We asked the Western Massachusetts author about the origins of her new novel, the twists and turns of writing it, and her inventive work as a literary … [Read more...]
Mythology and Traditional Stories in Art
Periodically, we pose questions about issues artists face in their work and lives. This month, we asked a group of artists, How do mythology, fables, folk tales, and traditional stories impact your art? Poet Kirun Kapur, visual artist Ethan Murrow, printmaker Debra Olin, Bharatanatyam dance artist Soumya Rajaram, and photographer Astrid Reischwitz … [Read more...]