Exhibitions - 2013
On Their Own: Carol O'Malia
November 18, 2012 - February 17, 2013
Reception, Sunday, November 18, 1:30 - 3:30 PM
Duxbury Art Association Annual Winter Juried Show
February 10 - April 27, 2013
This year marks the thirty-ninth anniversary of the Duxbury Art Association (DAA) Annual Winter Juried Show. The show encompasses artwork in all media by New England artists, predominantly from the metropolitan Boston, South Shore and Cape Cod areas. A five-judge panel of working artists and art educators reviews the entries and selects approximately one hundred pieces for exhibition. Cash awards are given in each category for “First Place” and for "Best in Show." Ribbons are awarded for “Second,” “Third” and “Honorable Mention.”
Maureen Vezina, Marshfield, Massachusetts, Pumphouse and Trailer, 2011, oil on canvas
Rotations
For 2013, Rotations returns to its original format of showing work from the major parts of the permanent collection. The collection numbers over eight thousand pieces and its scope is extensive, rooted in the personal tastes of Co-Founders Carl A. and Edith G. Weyerhaeuser. The major strengths of the collection are: Shaker, Works on Paper, including American and European prints; American Paintings and Asian Art. The museum continues to purchase objects for the collection from its exhibitions, auctions and galleries, and directly from contemporary artists in New England and beyond.
The Shaker collection numbers more than six hundred pieces of furniture, woodenware and artifacts. It is widely recognized among Shaker authorities for its quality and breadth. The initial interest in things Shaker came from Maud Moon Weyerhaeuser Sanborn, whose home in the Berkshires was close to the Hancock and New Lebanon Shaker communities. Mrs. Sanborn became active in the restoration of Hancock Shaker Village through her friendship with its president, Amy Bess Miller. She passed this interest to her son, Carl Weyerhaeuser, who built the collection. In recent years, curators have begun adding, again, to this collection in an effort to more fully tell the Shaker story.
Shaker Armed Rocker, Canterbury, New Hampshire
Co-founder, Carl A. Weyerhaeuser collected paintings and prints that he loved,
not necessarily what was in vogue. His interests culminated in a distinctive and varied collection, recognized for its significance in an ever-changing art world. What distinguishes Works on Paper is the wide range and mastery of the various print techniques. Carl Weyerhaeuser’s choices ultimately represented artists of lasting esteem in the print world, reflecting his appreciation for their command of line and draftsmanship.
Prints by George Bellows (1882-1925) are the opening choices for Rotations Gallery. Bellows not only represents a master-innovator and proponent of the lithograph as an artistic medium, but also a leader in American Regionalism. As Weyerhaeuser is known for his unique interests in art, Bellows is known for his unique portrayal of everyday life; of landscape as a social setting, both in print and oil painting. Other selections of prints, photographs and more, selected from a span of over seven centuries, will be rotated at various times throughout the year.
George Bellows, United States, 1882-1925, A Stag at Sharkey’s, 1917, lithograph
The American Painting collection is well rounded with examples of the Hudson River School, American Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Regionalism, Tonalism and Modernism. The later style of George Inness (1825-1894) is expressed in a grand scale in Eventide -Tarpon Springs, Florida, on view beginning in February. Inness’ poetic vision offers the hazy, almost mystical, atmosphere of nineteenth-century Tonalism with a modernist use of form and space. Visitors will be able to see more examples from various artistic styles throughout the year.
George Inness, United States, 1825-1894, Eventide, Tarpon Springs, Florida, 1893, oil on canvas
The Asian collection spans the years from around 3,000 B.C.E to the present, including art from China, Japan, India, Tibet, Thailand, Burma, Korea and Persia. All the different media are represented. Paintings include the various formats of hanging scroll, handscroll, album leaf, flat and folding fan, screen and miniature. Subjects range from landscape to portraiture, to bird and flower. There are also bronzes, ceramics, glass, lacquer, textiles, sculpture and prints. In addition, Buddhist, Hindu, Jain and Islamic images are included. Objects used in the Japanese Tea Ceremony are a special feature. The Weyerhaeusers’ lengthy friendship with Kojiro Tomita (1890-1977), Curator of Asiatic Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, deepened their understanding and appreciation of the culture of this region. To begin 2013’s exhibition schedule, an important teabowl by Raku Sonyu (1664-1716) will be highlighted with representative Chinese and Indian objects. Objects from other cultures will follow throughout the year in this alternating exhibition.
Raku Sonyu, Japan, 1664-1716, Tea Bowl named Eboshi, 1713, black raku-ware
On Their Own
Anne Krinsky: Reconfigurations
February 24 - May 19, 2013
Reception and gallery talk with the artist, Sunday, March 3, 1:30 - 3:30 PM
Anne Krinsky’s layered acrylic abstractions reference the geometry of place on three continents. Their sources include Gloucester, Massachusetts, where she was the Goetemann Artist-in-Residence at the Rocky Neck Art Colony; the vernacular architecture of Tunisia, where she traveled just before that country’s Arab Spring revolution; and the Thames riverside in southeast London, where her current studio is located.
The most recent architectural references in Krinsky’s paintings draw from her move to London, last summer. “The stretch of the Thames Path between Greenwich and Woolwich that I cycle en route to my studio is not conventionally beautiful,” the artist writes. “Incinerators, ships in various stages of decommissioning, reclaimed marshland, the Tate & Lyle sugar refinery and the futuristic, metal-clad structure of the Thames Flood Barrier that spans the river just outside my studio building are all part of a changing tidal riverscape. Responding to this new visual environment is affecting my work in unexpected ways.”
Her exhibition also features Shelf Life - the artist’s site-specific installation about books and archived materials. Displayed on minimal white shelves, Shelf Life is comprised of richly surfaced, intimately scaled panels whose imagery derives from books and museum artifacts. The newest panels in the installation were made in response to Asian manuscripts and paintings in the museum’s collection. The artworks that inspired Krinsky will be on view in conjunction with her installation.
“It was a real treat to go behind the scenes and closely examine some of the treasures in the museum’s wonderful Asian collection,” says Krinsky. “I am grateful to Collections Manager Maureen Wengler and Director Charles Weyerhaeuser for providing me access. Making art is a very tactile experience. For an artist, being able to see the texture of the silk and the subtle layers of ink-on-paper at close range is so meaningful. The stylized cloud forms woven into the silk on which some of the painted scrolls are backed fascinated me and formed the basis for new panels. In them, I played with different viscosities of acrylic mediums and pigment to suggest the action of wind and water these abstracted patterns brought to mind.”
In the Shelf Life panels, as in her architecturally inspired works on view, Krinsky employs a variety of painted and printed media including acrylic, acrylic transfer, silkscreen, collage, graphite and crayon. She also sands down some areas to reveal traces of previous layers or to merge many paint applications into a single seductive surface.
Anne Krinsky, London, England, Shelf Life Duxbury, 2012, Acrylic, acrylic transfer, silkscreen
and mono print on panels, on shelves
New England Society of Botanical Artists
From the Mountains to the Sea: Plants, Trees, and Shrubs of New England
May 19 – September 8, 2013
The New England Society of Botanical Artists’ exhibit of native New England plant portraits is the first stop of an ambitious eighteen month show of works on paper which will travel to all of the New England states. This first juried show, From the Mountains to the Sea: Plants, Trees and Shrubs of New England will include seaweed, fungi, spectacular wild and garden flowers, trees and shrubs in traditional botanical art style - botanically correct and aesthetically appealing.
Botanicals (left to right) by Kelly Leahy Radding, Columbia, Connecticut; Kay Kopper, Pembroke,
Massachusetts; Pamela Geer Gordon, Wellesley, Massachusetts.
The American Society of Botanical Artists, and its local chapter, The New England Society of Botanical Artists seek to: promote public appreciation of the art and science of botanical art and illustration; educate individuals and organizations about botanical art and illustration through exhibits, lectures, workshops, and outreach programs; understand the structure of plants and communicate this knowledge to their audience in an aesthetically pleasing manner; preserve, protect and promote plant diversity.
In keeping with the mission of its parent organization, the New England Society will provide artist demonstrations as well as gallery talks on subjects such as the history of botanical art throughout the world and in colonial America during the Age of Discovery. In addition, a second body of botanical artwork by South Shore artists will be on display portraying plants from many habitats throughout the world.
In addition to The Art Complex Museum, the exhibition will also be shown at the Montshire Museum of Science in Norwich, Vermont; the Bartlett Arboretum, in Stamford, Connecticut; the Audubon Education Center in Bristol, Rhode Island and the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens.
Artists include professionals whose works are catalogued and collected by Carnegie Mellon Univercity’s Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation in Pennsylvania, as well as those who are illustrators for the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C., the New York Botanical Garden and other institutions. In addition, amateur artists are welcomed into the organization. For more information about the art and artists, visit their website at www.NESBAartists.org
On Their Own
Adria Arch: Iconic
May 26 – August 18, 2013
Dynamic shapes, eccentric edges and surprising juxtapositions of color characterize the work of Adria Arch. She says, “These elements, spattered across and extending beyond the picture plane, bring to mind galaxies and explosions of energy. The compositions suggest randomness, belying an intentional painting process in which I project and then paint enlarged pencil lines onto canvas, wood panel, or walls. My practice grows out of the tradition of mark-making. I am drawn to the expressiveness found in unselfconscious pencil doodles - some I find and some I elicit from other people. The eccentric lines derived from these marginal marks are, for me, metaphors for boundless physical energy: floating, spinning, and falling through space.”
Arch’s work has many diverse precedents in visual history including Elizabeth Murray, Philip Guston, Jean Dubuffet, Modernist decorative arts, and contemporary street art. She also makes oblique references to doodles, petroglyphs, cuneiform script and hobo signs. Her site-specific, collaborative murals may be viewed at Lesley University's Porter Square building in Cambridge, Massachusetts and the Danforth Museum of Art in Framingham, Massachusetts.
Adria Arch, Arlington, Massachusetts, Unstrung Triptych, 2012, acrylic on canvas, 60" by 120"
Coastal Printmakers
August 25 – November 10, 2013
The Coastal Printmakers was founded in 2007 by husband and wife printmakers Robert and Elaine Cunniff of Kingston. The inaugural show for the Coastal Printmakers was held in the summer of 2007 at Highfield Hall, an historic mansion on the former Beebe Estate in Falmouth. Coastal Printmakers presents an annual group show at the James Library and Center for the Arts in Norwell to benefit its programs.
The success and enthusiasm of the group has spread by word of mouth. There are now close to forty artists in the group, including several award winners, many of whom have shown in the Duxbury Art Association Annual Winter Juried Show hosted by the museum. For this exhibition, member artists submitted three works and museum Contemporary Curator, Craig Bloodgood chose one.
Joan Drescher, Hingham, Massachusetts, Vibration, Orange, 2012, monotype with collage, oil inks, cardboard, collage paper, watercolor, glue
Pastel Painters Society of Cape Cod
Painting New England in Pastel!
September 22, 2013 – January 19, 2014
The impressions that come to mind when you hear someone say “I’m from New England” is the subject of a new exhibition in soft pastels, “Painting New England in Pastel!” at the museum by the Pastel Painters Society of Cape Cod. It is a thematic exploration of what gives America’s northeast corner its identity, as seen through the eyes of pastel artists strongly connected to this beautiful part of our country.
At the heart of New England’s strong regional character lie its people, places, food, flora and fauna. Through the depiction of iconic images, this exhibition presents a visual montage of the vast variety that somehow melds together to create that sense of belonging in New England. The paintings in the show range from representational art depicting rugged and beautiful landscapes and coastlines to contemporary works showing people at work and at play. Interpretive depictions of the many and varied culinary delights available in our six states may be found, along with such subjects as its wonderful variety of native animals and plants.
The pronouncement “I’m from New England” is likely to evoke images as varied as the individuals who hold them. A mélange of thoughts come to mind – lobsters and lighthouses, the Red Sox and Rhode Island Reds, Green Mountains and White Mountains, prep schools and Patriots, coastlines and covered bridges, small town scenes and salt water taffy, beaches, barns, birds and bogs. These subjects have inspired generations of artists and writers; the Pastel Painters Society of Cape Cod is challenging the best of New England contemporary artists to capture new concepts depicting New England in pastel.
Works included in the exhibition must be at least eighty percent soft pastel, an artistic medium consisting of pure powdered pigment (the same as is used in oil paints) held together with a neutral binder (generally gum arabic or gum tragacanth). Pastelists often combine soft pastels with an oil wash or watercolor underpainting in creating their art; these other mediums can occupy only twenty-percent to qualify for this exhibition.
The Pastel Painters Society of Cape Cod (PPSCC) is a non-profit corporation sustained by membership contributions, gifts, workshop fees and grants. Founded in 1995, the society seeks to create a community of pastel artists, to set standards of excellence through education, and to encourage and nurture artists in their professional growth. Members are pleased to sponsor this exhibition at the museum as an effort to educate the public of the permanence, versatility, and value of the medium of pastel and offer opportunities for members to participate in juried shows and exhibitions devoted to pastels.
The society has 250 members in thirty states and United States territories. It belongs to the International Association of Pastel Societies (IAPS). Members invite visitors to come and see a New England journey in pastel at the museum. Painting New England in Pastel! celebrates many of the unique qualities of life found here. For more information, visit www.pastelpainterssocietyofcapecod.com.
Deborah Quinn-Munson, Chester, Connecticut, A Walk in the Park, 2012, pastel over oil wash
Stacy Latt Savage/ Shane Savage-Rumbaugh
Complex Conversations: Caretaking - Past, Present and Future
November 17, 2013 – February 16, 2014
An obvious thought when having a male and female artist together in a visual conversation might be how they define or even epitomize their own gender perspectives. Shane and Stacy, husband and wife, however, both tend toward the middle of the gender spectrum. They move in and out of traditional and non-traditional gender roles as artists and as people. They dovetail caretaking and home-life. Their artwork grows from home, their literal common ground. They share a mutual respect and passion for figurative artwork and use representation and naturalism as a starting point in their studios to express their individual impressions of the human experience. Stacy and Shane’s most resonant artistic dialogue is often non-verbal, and they palpably influence one another by their actions as well as through each artist’s production.
Stacy says, “I observe, build, cut away, rebuild, layer and invent - all the while wrestling to compose what it looks like to feel human. My sculptures combine representational figurative elements with structural interpretations of natural forms. Pattern, rhythm, gesture, texture and material are the tools I use to build artwork that resembles the ever-complex layers of emotion. My inward look toward human nature leads me to the variety of responses any individual can have toward a single event or experience. It feels to me that almost anything can happen, at any given time, given the right set of circumstances. In my artwork, I want to simultaneously reveal what is perceived on the surface as well as what is often felt privately and concealed.”
Shane points to a quote by the French painter Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, “One must keep right on drawing; draw with your eyes when you cannot draw with a pencil." He notes, “This quote by Ingres seems to get to the heart of what it is about artmaking that’s central to my commitment. The impulse is always with me, and it’s always enriching my experience of the world. Art has magnified my awareness of structures and patterns. Knowledge tends to deepen mystery for me, because the more I learn, the more I realize there is to know. I pay attention to relationships (visual, social, structural) and systems at work. Echoes are everywhere - like the double spiraling pattern expressed in galactic swirling as well as in satellite photographs of hurricanes, in hair tracts on heads, in fingerprints, in the symbol of Yin/Yang, and in the churning turbulence of Van Gogh’s Starry Night. Being an artist has improved my life by provoking me to be an active participant in it.”
Stacy Latt Savage, New Bedford, Massachusetts, Detail ofSwarm, 2011, hydrocal and wood
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