Fine Arts
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MASS MoCA Update
Winter/ Spring Programming
By: - Dec 14th, 2017MASS MoCA heads into the winter/spring season with new works in the spotlight, on stage, and in the galleries. The season kicks off on January 20 with the museum’s annual Free Day, when MASS MoCA opens its galleries, free of charge, and activates its art with family-focused activities and performances throughout the day.
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Berkshire Museum Top Arts Story of 2017
Coverage Morphed from Local to National News
By: - Dec 26th, 2017A decision on an appeal by Attorney General of Massachusetts, Maura Healey, to halt the sale of 40 key works of art at Sothebys on behalf of the Berkshire Museum will be decided by the end of January. Van Shields, now on medical leave as director of the museum, and board president, Elizabeth "Buzz" McGraw, announced their $60 million plans for a New Vision in July. What started as a local story has morphed into national and global coverage. The outcome of this unethical attempt at deaccessioning by a pariah museum may have a game changing impact on the mandate of all American museums' commitment to preserve and conserve collections for future generations.
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The Jewel Of The Douro Valley
Since 1880 Ramos Pinto Has Produced Port
By: - Jan 07th, 2018The Ramos Pinto brothers founded Ramos Pinto in 1880 and marketed the port wine producing company to Brazilians. They commissioned remarkable artworks illustrating their products and guerilla marketing practices. Today, the posters are iconic and the new owners, Champagne Roederer, have been following in the footsteps of Antonio and Adriano Ramos Pinto.
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Berkshire Museum Will Gut Its Collection
Matter to be Settled with Supreme Judicial Court
By: - Feb 10th, 2018A compromise is a deal that neither side is happy with. Other than a few hard fought concessions the Berkshire Museum will now gut the museum and its collection in pursuit of its vulgarian, populist New Vision. It's tarnished leadership, including director, Van Shields and board president, Elizabeth McGraw, will have a tough job earning back the trust and support of a community which they so adroitly alienated.
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David Ricci’s Edge of Chaos
Studio Visit with a Berkshire Photographer
By: - Feb 14th, 2018For the past year the Berkshire based photographer, David Ricci, has been working on a large format, expensive and ambitious book. It has a working title of Edge of Chaos and surveys four decades of his oeuvre. During a studio visit we viewed the work and how it is evolving into a publication.
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Thomas Merton's The Glory of the Word
Coney Island of the Mind
By: - Feb 14th, 2016Thomas Merton observed that the meditation exercises in the Buddhist tradition in many ways were more refined and subtle than those of Christianity and sought to integrate them into the monastic tradition of the Church without changing the importance of Christian notions of salvation. At a moment when his drift toward Eastern thought was picking up speed he died accidentally from electrocution due to bad wiring in a Thai hotel.
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Ringling Museum in Sarasota, Florida
A Three Ring Circus of Art
By: - Mar 22nd, 2024The Ringling Museum in Sarasota, Florida is one of the most unique, and curious collections in America. It is sited on a manicured, tropical, 66-acre campus that conflates nature, leisure, warmth and depth in Old Master paintings, Ancient Mediterranean art, Asian art, 19th and 20th century art, prints, drawings and photography, as well as extensive circus related memorabilia. There are period rooms with collections of decorative arts. Through expansion it is now the 20th largest American museum.
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Connected Spaces: Cheryl Ann Thomas & Michael F. Rohde
At Gallery NAGA
By: - Jan 03rd, 2023Gallery NAGA welcomes 2023 with a selection of works by two artists, Cheryl Ann Thomas and Michael F. Rohde, in a feat of interdisciplinary collaboration. This exhibition was first organized by the American Museum of Ceramic Art in Pomona California and curated by Jo Lauria, Adjunct Curator for the American Museum of Ceramic Art and a design historian based in Los Angeles, California.
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Dear Suzanne By Eve Rifkah
19th Century French Artist and Model
By: - Dec 28th, 2022Her father, an artist, took the poet Eve Rifkah to the Museum of Fine Arts. There the young girl became intrigued by Suzanna Valadon the model for Renoir's stunning Bal a Bougival. She has written a book of verse comprising conversations with and about herself and the legendary artist/ model. Our paths crossed at Manship Artists Residency.
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Jeanne Renaud (1928 - 2022)
Montreal Artist and Choreographer
By: - Sep 16th, 2022Jeanne Renaud the Montreal artist, dancer and choreographer has passed away at 94. She created choreography for the film Brèves histoires de pierres muettes (2018) and le Projet Feldman/Renaud à la Salle Bourgie in 2021, with the dancers Louise Bédard and Marc Boivin.
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Peri Schwartz: Self Portraits & Studio Paintings
At Boston's Gallery NAGA
By: - Jan 08th, 2021The exhibition comprises a mix of both studio paintings as well as self portraits dating to the 80s and 90s. The studio paintings reflect Schwartz’s long history of using her space as her subject matter.
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James T. Demetrion at 90
Former Director of Hirshorn Museum
By: - Dec 02nd, 2020James T. Demetrion, the second and longest-serving director of the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (1984–2001) and director of the Des Moines Art Center (1969–1984) and Pasadena Art Museum (1964–1966), died Nov. 29. Demetrion had celebrated his 90th birthday in July.
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What Joe Thompson Means to Northern Berkshire County
The Daunting Legacy of MASS MoCA
By: - Aug 22nd, 2020Joe Thompson graduated from Williams College in 1981. As founding director of MASS MoCA he has been here ever since. Stepping down in October he will sever ties next summer. Between now and then he will plan the next move. Other than some loose ends his remarkable work here is complete. Magnificently so.
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Collage Brain: Insights, Ideas, Inspiration
An Ilustrated Book by Berkshire Artist
By: - Jun 13th, 2020The collage artist Lynn Gall divides time between the Berkshire and New York where she works and exhibits. Collage Brain: Insights, Ideas, Inspiration is her first book.
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Berkshire Cartoonist Howard Cruse
Stuck Rubber Baby's 25th Anniversary Edition
By: - May 01st, 2020Howard Cruse was a pioneering gay cartoonist and Berkshire neighbor. He passed away last year. His legendary Stuck Rubber Baby is having its 25th anniversary edition. The publication will be available this summer.
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WHEN, show at MASS MoCA
By Ledelle Moe
By: - Jan 25th, 2020WHEN: Not if, but when all our lives come to an end. - Here we are searching for personal meaning and memories via a monumental sculpture exhibition that expresses obliquely life and death issues of today and since Millennia.
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Phenomenal Nature at Met Breuer
Mrinalini Mukherjee, Sculptor
By: - Jun 17th, 2019Phenomenal Nature, the first American retrospective of the remarkable sculptures of Indian artist, Mrinalini Mukherjee, will be on display at the Met Breuer until September 29 and is well worth viewing.
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Broadway in Winter
Museums by Day and Theatre at Night
By: - Jan 25th, 2018The motive was not to miss a once- in-a-lifetime exhibition Michelangelo: Divine Draftsman & Designer at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It remains on view through February 12. In addition to visiting museums by day we enjoyed four nights on Broadway. During the Big Chill we avoided threeh our holiday lines at the Met. There was easy access and a good selection for half price TKTS in Times Square.
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The Pioneering 1960s Art of USCO
Looking Back at Early Art and Technology
By: - Jan 14th, 2018When an opportunity to celebrate USCO’s pioneering work came along, I just had to curate it. This acknowledgement of our cultural past, still clearly resonates in our 21st Century present.
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Owens Pottery of North Carolina
North Carolina's Route 705 Is the Pottery Highway
By: - Nov 11th, 2017The oldest, continuously operating pottery along the Pottery Highway is Owens Pottery of North Carolina, also known as Original Owens Pottery. The Owens family has been involved in pottery since the early 1800s.
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Three Artists Out on a Limb
Eclipse Mill Gallery Shows Pendell, Sutro and Vera
By: - Sep 12th, 2017Out on a Limb explores the creative process and how it engenders a final product. The exhibiting artists employ painting, collage, fiber art, and preliminary drawing to embody how new ideas push change. The exhibition at Eclipse Mill Gallery in North Adams features work by Debi Pendell, Sarah Sutro and Betty Vera. The opening will occur Saturday, September 30, from 6-8pm.
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Financial Crisis of the Berkshire Museum
What Do the Numbers Add Up To
By: - Aug 16th, 2017As a matter of public record we have examined the Federal tax information Form 990 disclosures of the Berkshire Museum from 2011 to 2015. They do not appear to create a profile of a cultural institution in dire straits. The museum is going forward with last ditch plans to sell 40 works of art. It is possible that there has been a dramatic downturn in the past two years? A Berkshire Eagle editorial asked “Why deny access to the museum's profit/loss statements for the past two years?" Based on reports for the prior five years we have questions for the museum, its director, Van Shields, and the board of trustees.
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Jane Hudson Exhibition in Williamstown
Exploring Modernism and Updating Abstraction
By: - Jun 07th, 2017Jane Hudson is known to the Berkshire arts community as the other half of the rock duo, Jeff and Jane, as well as for tending shop at various incarnations of Hudson's Antiques. On Sunday, June 17 from 3:30 to 5:30 PM., an exhibition of her abstract works on paper will open at Hudson Art, 112 Water Street in Williamstown.
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Reconstructions by Sarah Fagan
Eclipse Mill Gallery Exhibition Through June 24
By: - May 30th, 2017The exhibition Reconstructions by Sarah Fagan at the Eclipse Mill Gallery through June 24 combines abstract works on paper and modular geometric objects. The artist created the works over several months while focused on applying to graduate school. She will enroll this fall in the MFA program at the University of Texas in Austin.
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WOW at Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Mssachusetts
What a World of Wearable Art
By: - May 10th, 2017A recommendation for the Peabody Essex Museum to see particularly the special exhibition 'WOW' came in an understated manner, or I just did not pick up quickly enough what a delight the show would represent. We drove to Salem from Gloucester, where we were visiting, on a rainy and miserable afternoon and that made our day!
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