The Peabody Essex Museum’s exhibit Ripple Effect, the Art of H2O is targeted for the children and families crowd and is installed in the Art & Nature Center. But this is a show I would recommend to anyone with an interest in Earth Art, Land Art, Eco-Art, Art in Nature, Environmental Art. Both visual and […]
Spirit and Body
One morning beginning to notice which thoughts pull the spirit out of the body, and which return it. How quietly the abandoned body keens, like a bonsai maple surrounded by her dropped leaves. Rain or objects call the forgotten back. The droplets’ placid girth and weight. The table’s lack of ambition. How strange it is […]
Effort-Filled Effortlessness
Petit Interieur a la table de Marbre Ronde Sebastian Smee of the Boston Globe has been doing a series all summer called Frame by Frame where he focuses his attention on one particular work of art. These pieces are brief but insightful, a serialized reminder that Boston is full of masterpieces hanging in permanent collections. […]
With an Eye Always in Reserve
Man Ray, Observatory Time, The Lovers Peabody Essex Museum’s current show, Man Ray and Lee Miller, Partners in Surrealism, is part art exhibit and part psychological portrait of a relationship between two artists. While they were only together as a couple (in a very loosely defined sense) for a few years—from 1929 to 1932—the ramifications […]
Blindsighting and Other Perceptual Peculiarities
“Golamandi”, from a new painting series As athletes tend to their bodies, artists tend to their perceptions. But as our knowledge of peak athletic performance continues to improve, the domain of consciousness and perception is still full of mystery. Consider this from Nicholas Humphrey in the New York Times Book Review: A few days before […]
Harrows and Harvests
Cover of Gillian Welch’s last recording, The Harrow and the Harvest Life has rhythms and frequencies. Lots of them. And as I get older I am increasingly sensitized to the need to pay attention to what those are. Time to consider biodynamic agriculture? I’d say we need to consider biodynamic living. Plowing through to a […]
Boston Common: All’s Well That Ends Well
Will LeBow as the King of France in All’s Well That Ends Well, now playing on the Boston Common Do not miss the Commonwealth Shakespeare Company‘s production of All’s Well That End’s Well, free on the Common through August 14. Last year’s production of Othello with Seth Gilliam and James Waterston (reviewed here) was spectacular […]
Leaving the Heavy Behind
The light in Canada Politics and art have been combined and comingled in the past, producing work that is powerful and provocative. Goya. Guernica. Beckmann. But that isn’t the case for me and my way of working. In fact mixing the two is a toxic brew. Over the last week I have had to conscientiously […]
Show Highlights: In and Around Boston
A few personal highlights from shows in and near Boston: Ursula von Rydingsvard, Ocean Floor, 1996, cedar, graphite, and intestines (Photo courtesy of the Artist and Galerie Lelong. Photograph by Andy Ryan) Ursula von Rydingsvard Andy Goldsworthy Kysa Johnson deCordova Museum Lincoln MA From the museum’s intro to Ursula von Rydingsvard: Ursula von Rydingsvard works […]
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Weather Patterns
Skyline of the Wasatch Mountains in Salt Lake just after a cloudburst Yesterday I heard an interview with an American journalist on NPR. She has spent most of the last 8 years in Afghanistan reporting on the war. In the process she developed a deep affection for the country and its plight, so much so […]