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    The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research

  • We proudly offer more New England art news and reviews than anyone else.
  • Contact our researchers.
  • Disconcerting evidence concerning the nature of our existence.
  • Learn more about our founder and his Invisible Museum.
  • Search our extensive research archive.

    New England Art Awards

    Submit nominations for the 2010 New England Art Awards through Jan. 5.

    Worst Public Art
    in New England

  • Read our community beautification manifesto.
  • See the list of nominees.

    Check it out

  • Lynda Benglis, RISD Museum, Oct. 1, 2010, to Jan. 9, 2011.
  • "Hidden Treasures from the Forbidden City: The Emperor’s Private Paradise," Peabody Essex, Sept. 14, 2010, to Jan. 9, 2011.
  • John Osorio-Buck "The West Is Now Closed," Montserrat 301 Gallery, Oct. 4 to 29, 2010.
  • "American Letterpress: The Art of Hatch Show Print," Boston University Art Gallery, Sept. 9 to Oct. 31, 2010.
  • "Graphic Intervention: 25 Years of International AIDS Awareness Posters 1985-2010," MassArt, Sept. 13 to Dec. 4, 2010.
  • "Disfarmer Photos," Mass MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts, May 5 to Dec. 31, 2010.
  • "Nicholas Nixon: Family Album," Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, July 28, 2010, to May 1, 2011.
  • "Avedon Fashion: 1944-2000," Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Aug. 11, 2010, to Jan. 17, 2011.

    Photos

    Order photos by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research of the Honk Parade, Boston Caribbean Carnival (above), Salem’s Haunted Happenings Grand Parade, Bread and Puppet Theater, St. Peter’s Fiesta in Gloucester, and more.

    Grants and competitions

  • Maine Arts Commission Good Idea Grant Programs.
  • Massachusetts Cultural Council.
  • New Hampshire State Council on the Arts.
  • Rhode Island State Council on the Arts grants, deadlines: April 1 and Oct. 1.
  • Vermont Arts Council: artist development grants, deadline: 60 days prior to activity.

    Yokelism

  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 1: Boston lacks alternative spaces?
  • Yokelism at the 2008 Boston Art Awards.
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 2: Montreal case study.
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 3: Hire locally.
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 4: We need coverage of our living artists.
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 5: We need local retrospectives.
  • Yokelism update: Coverage of our living artists: Sebastian Smee responds.
  • Yokelism update: Dangers of Provincialism.
  • Yokelism update: Re: Dangers of Provincialism.
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 6: Could the CIA help?
  • Yokelism at the 2009 New England Art Awards.
  • Re: "Yokelism with your wallet out."
  • Globe: The revolution begins with Harvard – a Yokelist response.
  • Yokelist questions Globe diss of Boston
  • Yokelist Manifesto Number 7: Can you love Boston art and still love the Foster Prize?

    New England treasures

  • Fawcett’s Antique Toy & Art Museum, Waldoboro, Maine.
  • Gropius House in Lincoln, Massachusetts.
  • Frank Lloyd Wright's Zimmerman House in Manchester, New Hampshire.

    Seeing art for free

    Always free:
  • Addison Gallery, Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts.
  • AS220, Providence, Rhode Island.
  • Boston Athenaeum.
  • Boston Center for the Arts.
  • Boston College's McMullen Museum.
  • Brown University's Bell Gallery, Providence, Rhode Island.
  • Davis Museum, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts.
  • Harvard’s Carpenter Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
  • Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.
  • MassArt Galleries, Boston, Massachusetts.
  • MIT's List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
  • Montserrat College of Art, Beverly, Massachusetts.
  • Musee Patamecanique, Bristol, Rhode Island.
  • National Heritage Museum, Lexington, Massachusetts.
  • Rhode Island College's Bannister Gallery, Providence, Rhode Island.
  • Simmons College's Trustman Art Gallery, Boston, Massachusetts.
  • Tufts University Art Gallery, Medford, Massachusetts.
  • Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, Massachusetts.
  • Most commercial galleries are also always free.

    Sometimes free:
  • Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, daily from Nov. 1 to May 31.
  • Harvard Art Museum, Cambridge, 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, after 4:30 p.m. everyday (but they're only open until 5 p.m.).
  • Harvard's Peabody Museum, Cambridge, free to Massachusetts residents from 9 a.m. to noon every Sunday, and from 3 to 5 p.m. Wednesdays from September to May.
  • Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, 5 to 8 p.m. every Thursday; free to families (meaning children accompanied by as many as two adults) the last Saturday of each month.
  • Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 4 to 9:45 p.m. Wednesdays (but charge for special exhibitions).
  • New Bedford Art Museum, 5 to 9 p.m. second Thursday of each month. Also 5 to 7 p.m. Thursdays "donate what you can."
  • Photographic Resource Center, Boston University, Thursdays and the last weekend of each month.
  • Portland Museum of Art, Maine, 5 to 9 p.m. Fridays.
  • RISD Museum, Providence, 12 to 1:30 p.m. Fridays, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sundays, 5 to 9 p.m. third Thursday of each month, all day of the last Saturday of each month.
  • Worcester Art Museum, 10 a.m. to noon Saturdays.

  • Note: Public libraries often have free passes to museums.

Additional sites of New England inquiry

  • Zoom, Cambridge.
  • Vermont Art Zine, Vermont.
  • Truth and Beauty, Beverly, Mass.
  • Tiny Showcase, Providence.
  • The Steel Yard Blog, Providence.
  • Speak Clearly, Brandeis University, Waltham, Mass.
  • School of the Museum of Fine Arts Animation crew blog, Boston.
  • Rhode Island State Council on the Arts, Rhode Island.
  • Portland Museum of Art blog, Maine.
  • Our RISD, Providence.
  • North Shore Art Throb, greater Boston.
  • New Urban Arts, Providence.
  • New Bodgea, Boston, etc.
  • My Love for You Is a Stampede of Horses, Boston and national.
  • Modern Kicks, undisclosed location in southern New England.
  • Mass MoCA Blog, western Massachusetts.
  • Making the Art Seen, Malden, Mass.
  • Maine College of Art, Maine.
  • Maine Arts Commission, Maine.
  • Maine Art Scene, Maine.
  • Keepers of Tradition, Massachusetts.
  • Just Looking, Maine.
  • I Thought It Was Art, Boston.
  • The Hub Review, Boston.
  • HubArts, Boston.
  • The Girl in the Green Dress, Boston.
  • A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Internet, New Hampshire.
  • Exhibitionist, Boston.
  • Franklin Einspruch's Journal, Boston.
  • Cultural Productions, greater Boston.
  • Connecticut Art Scene, Connecticut.
  • Leslie K. Brown, Boston.
  • Boston Photography Focus, Boston.
  • Blog Addison, greater Boston.
  • Big Red & Shiny, Boston.
  • The Big Picture, Boston.
  • The Biggest Little, Providence.
  • The Berkshire Review, western Massachusetts.
  • Berkshire Fine Arts, western Massachusetts.
  • The Arts Fuse, Massachusetts.
  • Artsake, Massachusetts.
  • Art in Ruins, Providence.
  • Art Espirit, New Hampshire.
  • Artblog.net, Boston.
  • New media investigations

  • Rhizome
  • The Second Life Herald
  • ASCI
  • Eyebeam's reBlog
  • E-Flux
  • The Archives of the Journal

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    Spring Thaw Pow Wow at Brown

    April 20th, 2012

    The 11th annual Brown University Spring Thaw Pow Wow held in Providence on Saturday, April 14, as photographed by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research.













    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Boston Dynamics robot climbs stairs

    April 16th, 2012

    Plus new military robot tech from iRobot


    Boston Dynamics in Waltham, Massachusetts, is developing a humanoid robot that climbs stairs, can regain its balance after being shoved, and do pushups (see video above, which was posted Thursday) for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa). This comes on the heels of the March announcement that a galloping robot dubbed “Cheetah” that Boston Dynamics is developing for Darpa broke the land speed record for legged robots.

    Meanwhile, Darpa is also working with iRobot, the Bedford, Massachusetts, firm that developed the Roomba vacuum cleaning robot, to develop an improved suspension for tracked robots (see video below) that “improves the robot’s mobility over rough and uneven terrain. The technological enhancement enables faster transit speeds, climbing of very steep slopes, improved heading control, greater accommodation of debris entering the suspension and reduced impact forces on carried payloads.”

    Previously:
    March 6, 2012: Boston Dynamics’ new killer robot: “When is some local museum going to get around to showcasing the freaky, astounding stuff Boston Dynamics is producing?”

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Devil’s footprint in Ipswich?

    April 16th, 2012

    They say the Devil once set foot on the North Green of Ipswich, Massachusetts, and left his trace in a granite outcropping in front of where the First Church (Congregational United Church of Christ) in Ipswich now stands. Or as the Works Progress Administration’s 1937 “Massachusetts: A Guide to Its Places and People” reports: “Deep in the rock beside the present Congregational [church] building (1847) is a cloven hoofprint left, legend says, by the Devil.”

    Photos by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research.

    The “footprint” in front of the First Church (Congregational United Church of Christ) in Ipswich, built in 1971, (left) and the United Methodist Church (right).

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Poor Yokelist’s Almanack: Upcoming Events

    April 16th, 2012

    Wednesday, April 18, 11:30 a.m.
    Photo scholar and curator Leslie K. Brown speaks at Montserrat College of Art, 23 Essex St., Beverly, Massachusetts. Free.

    Wednesday, April 18, 6:30 p.m.
    Nathaniel Raymond, director of operations for the Satellite Sentinel Project at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, speaks about the project’s use of satellite imaging to monitor human rights abuses in Sudan and Syria. At Boston University Sargent College, Room 101, located at 635 Commonwealth Ave, Boston. Hosted by the Photographic Resource Center. $10.

    Thursday, April 19, 5:30 p.m.
    Patrick Lui speaks about his exhibit at Brown University’s Granoff Center, 154 Angell St., Providence.

    Thursday, April 19, 6:30 p.m.
    Montserrat College of Art teacher Martha Buskirk speaks about her book “Creative Enterprise: Contemporary Art between Museums & Marketplace” at Montserrat’s Odd Fellows Hall, 194 Cabot St., second floor, Beverly, Massachusetts. Free.

    Friday, April 20, noon to 4 p.m.
    Cambridge Mini Maker Faire at the Cambridge Science Fair at the Cambridge Public Library, 449 Broadway, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

    Saturday, April 21, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
    Boston conceptual artist Jessica Gath presents “For You, [W]Rapper” at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum
, 51 Sandy Pond Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts. Gath accepts, wraps and returns objects to visitors. “DeCordova invites you to bring a gift for a friend or a loved one so you may participate in Gath’s performance.”

    Saturday, April 21, 2:30 p.m.
    Photographer Jim Dow speaks at his exhibit at Robert Klein Gallery, 38 Newbury St., Boston. Free.

    Saturday, April 21, 7 p.m.
    Gallery 263 holds an art auction to benefit its programs at the gallery, 263 Pearl St., Cambridge, Massachusetts. $10.

    Monday, April 23, 4:30 p.m.
    Nancy Selvage speaks at UMass Lowell classroom O’Leary 222 somewhere around 71 Wilder St., Lowell, Massachusetts.

    Monday, April 23, 7 p.m.
    Michael Eng of Ohio’s John Carroll University speaks about “Sound and Semiocapitalism: Affective Labor and the Metaphysics of the Real,” at MIT’s Art, Culture and Technology Cube, Wiesner Building, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Part of MIt’s “Experiments in Thinking, Action and Form” lecture series.

    Tuesday, April 24, 7 p.m.
    MIT professor Hanna Rose Shell speaks about her book “Hide and Seek: Camouflage, Photography and the Media of Reconnaissance” at Brookline Booksmith, 279 Harvard St., Brookline, Massachusetts. Free.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Mass Tea Party Patriots Day Rally

    April 15th, 2012

    The Massachusetts Tea Party Coalition held its “Patriots Day Rally” on Boston Common today. Gay rights activists stood at the back protesting the rally.

    Photos by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research.











    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

    Danforth seeks “Off the Wall” submissions

    April 12th, 2012

    The Danforth Museum of Art in Framingham, Massachusetts, is seeking submissions for its annual “Off the Wall” juried exhibit this summer. The deadline to apply is tomorrow, April 13. Details are here.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Poor Yokelist’s Almanack: Upcoming Events

    April 9th, 2012

    Monday, April 9, 7 p.m.
    MIT professor Muntadas speaks about “Projects and Protocols: Conventions on Art and Technology” at MIT’s Art, Culture and Technology Cube, Wiesner Building, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Part of MIt’s “Experiments in Thinking, Action and Form” lecture series.

    Tuesday, April 10, 6 p.m.
    Photographer Todd Hido speaks at Harvard’s Arthur Sackler Museum lecture hall, 485 Broadway, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Free.

    Tuesday, April 10, 6:30 p.m.
    Andi Sutton presents a workshop, “Conversation in Memorial” on “how to make seed bearing lawn ornament sculptures,” as part of “The Garden Lab” project at MassArt’s Brant Gallery, 621 Huntington Avenue, Boston.

    Wednesday, April 11, 1:30 p.m.
    Laura Ziman presents “Food Lab” as part of “The Garden Lab” project at MassArt’s Brant Gallery, 621 Huntington Avenue, Boston.

    Thursday and Friday, April 12 and 13, 7:30 p.m.
    “Curious Magic: The Magic Lantern Slides of the Museum of Natural History,” a multi-media performance by Magic Lantern Cinema featuring the Museum of Natural History’s antique magic lantern slides plus live music by Blevin Blectum + Alexander Dupuis, at the Museum of Natural History and Planetarium, Roger Williams Park, 1000 Elmwood Avenue, Providence. In conjunction with the Museum of Natural History’s current exhibit “Curiouser: The Secret Lives of Specimens.” $3.

    Saturday, April 14
    MassArt holds its annual benefit art auction at 621 Huntington Ave., Boston.

    Saturday, April 14, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
    Boston conceptual artist Jessica Gath presents “For You, [W]Rapper” at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum
, 51 Sandy Pond Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts. Gath accepts, wraps and returns objects to visitors. “DeCordova invites you to bring a gift for a friend or a loved one so you may participate in Gath’s performance.”

    Sunday, April 15, 2 to 6 p.m.
    “Spring Zine Thing,” zine fair, at Washington Street Art Center, 321 D Washington St., Somerville, Massachusetts.

    Sunday, April 15, 2 to 5 p.m.
    Boston’s Hispanic Black Gay Coalition presents a book release party for “Shout it Out: Coming Out Black and Brown” at Club Café, 209 Columbus Ave., Boston. Free.

    Wednesday, April 18, 11:30 a.m.
    Photo scholar and curator Leslie K. Brown speaks at Montserrat College of Art, 23 Essex St., Beverly, Massachusetts. Free.

    CALLS FOR ART:
    Davis Art Gallery in Worcester, Massachusetts, seeks artists for its upcoming show “The Art of Fiber: Contemporary Fiber art from Traditional Techniques.” Deadline: May 4. Details: davisartgallery.com/Upcoming-Show.aspx

    The Amherst Public Art Commission is seeking western Massachusetts artists for its second Amherst Biennial in October and November 2012. Deadline: May 1. Details: amherstma.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=824

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    “Passion for the Christ” at First Parish Congregational Church Wakefield this week

    April 4th, 2012

    They say that during the worst of the 1633 plague the residents of Oberammergau, Germany, pledged to perform a play recounting the last days of Jesus every ten years if God would spare them. So beginning the next year, after the illnesses had subsided, they began presenting their epic passion play. And they still continue it. Nowadays performances last five hours, with as many as a thousand performers on stage at once. About half the 5,000 villagers take part.

    In 1980, Horace Hylan attended the Oberammergau passion play (see video below) and it knocked his socks off. When he returned to his home church of First Parish Congregational Church in Wakefield, Massachusetts, “He said we should do something like that,” Pamela Weisenbach Abkarian says.

    Hylan organized the Wakefield church’s community productions each year for about a decade before handing over the writing and directing to Abkarian. Some years the cast has featured as many as 40 performers and sets that filled the front of the church. This year’s version, which will be performed at the church for free on Thursday and Friday night, is more spare, featuring a cast of 16 adults and children on the candlelit altar.

    Abkarian’s script, which is accompanied with live piano by Don Hodgkins, is set on the evening of Holy Saturday, after Jesus’s crucifixion on Good Friday, and before his resurrection the next day, Easter Sunday. It is about being in this in between moment, this moment filled with doubts, after Jesus’s death, but before his miraculous return. His grief-stricken mother Mary (performed by Jo Lynn Foster, pictured above) says, “The God I know wouldn’t let it end like this.”

    The future of First Parish’s passion play itself is in doubt because Abkarian is moving to Rhode Island. “Unless somebody wants to take it over, this will be the last year,” she says. “They might do something else. Somebody else might pick up the torch and start a new tradition.”

    First Parish Congregational Church in Wakefield presents its annual “Passion for the Christ” Easter pageant at 8 p.m. Thursday and Friday, April 5 and 6, 2012, at 1 Church St., Wakefield, Massachusetts. Admission is free.

    Photos of last night’s dress rehearsal by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research.

    Caiaphas (Peter Rearick) calls Jesus a “radical” and “impostor.”

    “I was beyond saving. … Too many parties, too many lovers,” says the adulteress (Chandra Laboy) as Pilate (Andy Black) watches.

    Mother Mary (Jo Lynn Foster) and Pilate (Andy Black).

    “I’ve never felt so rotten in my life,” says Peter (Ish Laboy).

    “I’ve questioned guilty men before,” says Pilate (Andy Black). “And even with his passive defenses, I knew he wasn’t guilty.” (Above, from left, Dom Mercurio plays Matthew and Jim Fosnock plays Andrew.)

    Judas (Mark Hatheway).

    The whole cast with director Pamela Weisenbach Abkarian in front, second from left, at last night’s dress rehearsal.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Proposal for Figment Boston: Tent city

    April 2nd, 2012

    Figment Boston 2012 is seeking submissions for its June 2 and 3 festival of performances and installations on Boston’s Rose Kennedy Greenway. We heard about “its mission to offer free, inclusive and participatory art to entire communities, removing the barriers of museum and gallery walls and entrance fees and blurring the lines between those who create and those who enjoy art,” and we think we have the perfect proposal:

    A tent city (see planning renderings here) on the Greenway featuring live music, free food, American flags, and lots of signs about American economic inequality. Visitors would be invited to take part in interactive teach-ins, sign making, and standing with performers along the street holding signs describing how the American banking system nearly destroyed our economy, throwing thousands out of work. Project may result in some minor wear and tear on the grass, say $60,000 worth of repairs. Also perhaps $600,000 for monitoring by police officers working overtime.

    The deadline for applications is April 7. Figment’s proposal criteria explains that “All projects will be reviewed by Figment Boston and Greenway officials to make sure they meet context and impact guidelines.” Uh, oh.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

    Poor Yokelist’s Almanack: Upcoming Events

    April 2nd, 2012

    Monday, April 2, 9 a.m.
    The John Nicholas Brown Center presents “Collaborative Communities: Why We Need Them and How They Are Created” with Christina Bevilacqua of the Providence Athenaeum and Amy Greer of the Barrington Public Library at Nightingale Brown House, 357 Benefit St., Providence. $15, includes breakfast. Register by March 27.

    Monday, April 2, 7 p.m.
    Gloria Sutton of Northeastern University in Boston speaks about “Playback: Broadcast Experiments 1970 and Now” with MIT List curator João Ribas at MIT’s Art, Culture and Technology Cube, Wiesner Building, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Part of MIt’s “Experiments in Thinking, Action and Form” lecture series.

    Tuesday, April 3, 2 p.m.
    Fazal Sheikh speaks at MassArt, 621 Huntington Ave., Boston.

    Tuesday, April 3, 5:30 p.m.
    Jan Edler and Tim Edler of realites:united discuss their kinetic light installation “2 x 5” in Brown University’s Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, 154 Angell St., Providence.

    Tuesday, April 3, 6 p.m.
    Erica Hirshler, Croll Senior Curator of American Paintings at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, speaks about “Studios of their Own: Boston Women Artists and the Fenway Studios” as part of the Friends of Fenway Studios Series Talks at the Lenox Hotel, Boylston at Exeter streets, Boston. $50.

    Tuesday, April 3, 7 p.m.
    Walead Beshty speaks at RISD’s Chace Center Metcalf Auditorium, 20 North Main Street, Providence.

    Wednesday, April 4, 3 p.m.
    Theatrical production designer Wendall K. Harington talks about “Video for Performance, Insight, Image, Imagination” at Brown University’s Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, 154 Angell St., Providence.

    Wednesday, April 4, 5 p.m.
    Reception and talk with Gillian Christy at UMass Lowell University Gallery, 71 Wilder St., Lowell, Massachusetts.

    Wednesday, April 4, 7 p.m.
    Leela Corman reads from her graphic novel “Unterzakhn” at Brookline Booksmith, 279 Harvard St., Brookline, Massachusetts. Free.

    Wednesday, April 4, 7:30 p.m.
    Author and illustrator David Macaulay speaks at Brown University’s Granoff Center for the Creative Arts, 154 Angell St., Providence. Reserve free tickets via http://macaulay.eventbrite.com.

    Thursday, April 5, 11:30 a.m.
    Painter Matte Stephens speaks at Montserrat College of Art, 23 Essex St., Beverly, Massachusetts. Free.

    Thursday, April 5, 5:30 p.m.
    Lucas Foglia will talk and Forrest Gander will read in connection with Foglia’s photographs at Brown University’s List Art Center Auditorium, 64 College St., Providence. Free.

    Thursday, April 5, 6 p.m.
    Sue Johnson speaks at Harvard’s Carpenter Center, Room B-04, 24 Quincy St., Cambridge, Massachusetts.

    Thursday, April 5, 7 to 9 p.m.
    Painter Matte Stephens, teacher Fred Lynch and painter Mike Vance speak about “The Fine Art of Illustration” at speaks at Montserrat College of Art, 23 Essex St., Beverly, Massachusetts. Free.

    Friday, April 6, 9:30 a.m.
    Sylvère Lotringer presents a bus tour of Boston community gardens followed by a talk on the “Topology of Autonomy” at MIT, 20 Ames St., Cambridge, Massachusetts. Free, but RSVP: sberzof@mit.edu

    Saturday, April 7, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
    Boston conceptual artist Jessica Gath presents “For You, [W]Rapper” at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum
, 51 Sandy Pond Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts. Gath accepts, wraps and returns objects to visitors. “DeCordova invites you to bring a gift for a friend or a loved one so you may participate in Gath’s performance.”

    Saturday, April 7, 2 p.m.
    Artists Joe Wardwell and Ven Voisey speak about their musical influences at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum
, 51 Sandy Pond Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts.

    Monday, April 9, 7 p.m.
    MIT professor Muntadas speaks about “Projects and Protocols: Conventions on Art and Technology” at MIT’s Art, Culture and Technology Cube, Wiesner Building, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Part of MIt’s “Experiments in Thinking, Action and Form” lecture series.

    Tuesday, April 10, 6 p.m.
    Photographer Todd Hido speaks at Harvard’s Arthur Sackler Museum lecture hall, 485 Broadway, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Free.

    Tuesday, April 10, 6:30 p.m.
    Andi Sutton presents a workshop, “Conversation in Memorial” on “how to make seed bearing lawn ornament sculptures,” as part of “The Garden Lab” project at MassArt’s Brant Gallery, 621 Huntington Avenue, Boston.

    CALLS FOR ART:
    Davis Art Gallery in Worcester, Massachusetts, seeks artists for its upcoming show “The Art of Fiber: Contemporary Fiber art from Traditional Techniques.” Deadline: May 4. Details: davisartgallery.com/Upcoming-Show.aspx

    The Amherst Public Art Commission is seeking western Massachusetts artists for its second Amherst Biennial in October and November 2012. Deadline: May 1. Details: amherstma.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=824

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Mo Willems’s “The Duckling Gets a Cookie!?”

    March 29th, 2012

    Caldecott Honor winning author and artist Mo Willems of Northampton, Massachusetts, isn’t necessarily a great drawer. What makes him one of the great children’s book creators today is his feel for character. Which is what you might expect from the Emmy winning former writer for “Sesame Street.”

    “I don’t like the look of that title,” the Pigeon squawks at the start of Willems’s new picture book, “The Duckling Gets a Cookie!?” (Hyperion Books for Children). It’s a brief, witty tale about the cute little Duckling who gets a cookie because he politely asks for it and the jealous Pigeon, who never gets what he wants (see “Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!” “Don’t Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late!”). It’s all about the relationship between the two birds. Imagine them as siblings, or the Pigeon as a sort of young, sputtering Daffy Duck and the Duckling as a cool, suave Bugs Bunny type. “It’s NOT fair,” the Pigeon grumps. “Ducklings get everything!”

    Ultimately it’s a witty primer on manners and sharing—the Duckling gives the Pigeon his cookie, and then politely asks for another. The punchline is that the cunning Duckling gave up the first cookie not simply out of generosity, but because he didn’t like the flavor.

    Willems presents “The Duckling Gets a Cookie!?” at Coolidge Corner Theatre, 290 Harvard St., Brookline, Massachusetts, at 10:30 a.m. Sunday, April 1, 2012, as a program of Brookline Booksmith. Free, but tickets required.

    Previously:
    Mo Willems sculpture for Carle Museum.
    Mo Willems’s pigeon is pissed.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    Cesareo “Marco the Magi” Pelaez has died

    March 28th, 2012

    Cesareo R. Pelaez, popularly known as “Marco the Magi,” one of the stars and founding producer of long-running “Le Grand David and his own Spectacular Magic Company” in Beverly, Massachusetts, died March 24 at age 79. Fellow magicians pointed out that he passed on Houdini’s birthday.

    There have been rumors for months that “Le Grand David” show was winding down, and in February the theater ceased productions without any public announcement. An inside source told us then that the show was done, but The Salem News subsequently reported that organizers hoped to relaunch the show in April. The theater’s website lists shows for April and May.

    Pelaez’s role in the performances had been significantly curtailed since he had a stroke in 2005. “It takes a genius to put on a show like that,” said Raymond Goulet, who runs a magic museum and art studio in Watertown, told the Salem News this week. “Very few people can do everything, but Cesareo could. I considered him a miracle man. There hasn’t been a show in the history of magic that ran so long and had such a successful run.”

    More: Information from the funeral home. A remembrance. An obituary.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    The Crazy Hat Ladies of St. Peter’s Fiesta

    March 28th, 2012

    One of the newer traditions of the St. Peter’s Fiesta, the Catholic fishing festival in Gloucester, Massachusetts, each June, is the “Crazy Hat Ladies.” It began 18 years ago, Massachusetts state folklorist Maggie Holtzberg reports on her blog “Keepers of Tradition,” when sisters Robyn and Amy Clayton began constructing elaborate hats honoring the festival—Amy’s hats always depict the greasy pole, Robyn’s always feature the altar. You can’t miss them at the Fiesta.

    “The old Italian women absolutely love these hats,” Robyn tells Holtzberg. “The Fiesta committee [which is made up of mostly men], they recognize us as the crazy fiesta hat girls. Here we come. By no means are we mocking the Fiesta; we love this tradition.”

    Read Holtberg’s whole post here. She adds that she’s lined up the sisters to appear at the Lowell Folk Festival this July, “where they will join a variety of other hat and shoe makers in the folk craft area. They plan on bringing plenty of hats, some handouts, pictures of Fiesta over the years, and a huge cut-out of St. Peter for photo-taking opportunities. Their enthusiasm for hat making will be matched by their pride in representing Gloucester and St. Peter’s Fiesta. We’re honored to have them.”

    Pictured above: The Clayton sisters at the 2011 St. Peter’s Fiesta, as photographed by The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research.

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

    MIT invents camera that sees around corners

    March 28th, 2012

    MIT researchers have developed a camera that can see around corners, according to a paper published last week in the journal “Nature Communications.” Apparently it works something like active sonar, bouncing lasers off a wall opposite the doorway and measuring how quickly they bounce back. MIT reports: “The research could ultimately lead to imaging systems that allow emergency responders to evaluate dangerous environments or vehicle navigation systems that can negotiate blind turns, among other applications.” As with so many things at MIT, it’s probably best to read “other applications” as “war machines.”

    Posted by Greg Cook in Uncategorized | No Comments »

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    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

      News Headlines

    • “They have brought with them a ground-penetrating radar device, as well as two beagles and a ferret, to look for what they say are weapons. But we all know what they are actually looking for — and they are looking for the paintings,” said the attorney of the alleged mobster Robert Gentile’s home in Manchester, Connecticut. Law enforcement authorities have claimed that Gentile may know something about what happened to the paintings stolen from Boston’s Gardner museum in 1990.


    • Sanford school committee in Maine votes to drop “Redskins” team name–making it the final high school in the state to use the name.


    • Benjamin Lerman Coady, a 13-year-old from West Hartford, Connecticut, spotted what seemed to be a mistake on a map of the Byzantine empire at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. “The front desk didn’t believe me,” he told the Hartford Courant, explaining that he never expected to hear back from the museum. “I’m only a kid.” But months later he got an e-mail from the museum’s Byzantine art curator: “You are, of course, correct about the boundaries of the Byzantine Empire under Justinian…”


    • MoMA curator Kathy Halbreich spent the summer of 1965 at Skowhegan, Gallerist NY reports from a New York dinner for the Maine artist residency, “and described herself as ‘the first and last 16 year old to attend.’ She also mentioned that it was ‘the first time I got stinking drunk, which prepared me for a life in the arts’ … Alex Katz, who was teaching at the school the summer Ms. Halbreich attended, had something to do with her ditching her career as an artist to become a curator and historian. His critique of one of her paintings was ‘take it away.’” Also, Kara Walker “didn’t want to talk about the time in the early 90′s when Skowhegan rejected her application.”


    • Two paintings by Childe Hassam and Gustave Courbet that resurfaced in 2007 after being stolen during a violent home invasion in Shcrewsbury, Massachusetts, on July 2, 1976, are scheduled to be auctioned by Sotheby’s in New York City on May 4.


    • National Endowment for the Arts makes big cuts in grants to PBS.


    • Boston’s Orchard Gardens K-8 pilot school is one of eight schools nationwide selected to participate in the federal Turnaround Arts program, a public-private partnership aiming to “test the hypothesis that high-quality and integrated arts education boosts academic achievement, motivates student learning, and improves school culture in the context of overall school reform,” the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities announced.


    • Thomas “Painter of Light” Kinkade died April 6 at age 54.


    • Art critic Hilton Kramer, who died March 27, spent his last months in the Vicarage by the Sea in Harpswell, Maine, a residential home with a nontraditional approach to caring for those with advanced dementia. “Before Kramer moved into the Vicarage last June from their home in Damariscotta, his widow said, his disease had advanced to the point where he rarely spoke. The man who founded the intellectual magazine New Criterion, and who had served as the chief art critic of The New York Times, had lost all interest in his field,” Matt Hongoltz-Hetling reports in a striking piece in The Forecaster. (H/t to Edgar Beem.) Previous care kept Kramer heavily medicated, isolated, limited his mobility, and had him putting on 30 pounds. At the Vicarage, Hongoltz-Hetling writes, they reduced Kramer’s medication and embrace patients’ behaviors. “‘If someone wants to go for a walk, we let them go for a walk,’ [founder Johanna] Wigg said. ‘We go with them.’ And if someone develops a desire to kiss the hands of all those he encounters, as Kramer did, the Vicarage doesn’t try to quash that desire with medication. … ‘His affect all came back,’ Wigg said.”


    • Brandeis police notes: “March 27—A party reported that he saw two people attempting to gain access to the roof of the Rose Art Museum and the Faculty Club. University Police found the people and determined that there was no malicious intent. No further action was taken,” according to The Justice.


    • A federal prosecutor alleges that reputed 75-year-old Connecticut mobster Robert Gentile has information about the 1990 theft of 13 masterworks from Boston’s Gardner Museum. “The government has reason to believe that Mr. Gentile had some involvement with stolen property out of the District of Massachusetts,” The Hartford Courant reports that Assistant U.S. Attorney John Durham said during a bail hearing for Gentile on unrelated drug charges.


    • RISD students help clean up abandoned synagogue on Broad Street in Providence.


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      Talks from our archives

    • Lynda Barry, Oct. 2, 2008.
    • Eleanor Callahan and Barbara, Nov. 11, 2008.
    • Nick Cave, Oct. 8, 2007.
    • Brian Chippendale, May 16, 2008, part one and two.
    • Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Sept. 23, 2008.
    • Chuck Close, Nov. 1, 2007.
    • Gregory Crewdson, Oct. 29, 2008.
    • Lynda Hartigan of the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, July 16, 2008.
    • Anish Kapoor, May 27, 2008.
    • Dennis Kois, director of DeCordova Museum, June 9, 2008.
    • Ernest Morin, July 21, 2008.
    • Dan Moynihan, Brookline cartoonist and illustrator Oct. 8, 2009.
    • Damian Ortega, Sept. 15,2009.
    • Gary Panter, April 11, 2008, and Sept. 20, 2006.
    • Martha Rosler, Nov. 21, 2008.
    • Stefan Sagmeister, April 25, 2008.
    • Neil Salley of the Musée Patamécanique in Bristol, Rhode Island, Aug. 16, 2007.
    • Jon Sarkin, July 31, 2008.
    • Peter Schumann of Bread and Puppet Theater (pictured above), Aug. 12, 2008, part one, two and three; Jan 23, 2008, part one and two.
    • Richard Serra, June 1, 2008.
    • Rachel Whiteread, Oct. 14, 2008.

      News to us

    • Boston Globe: The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research is one of "The best of the (local) web."
    • Edgar Allen Beem of Yankee Magazine: "Indispensable ... Probably the best regional art site in the country."
    • The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research is a winner of a 2009 Creative Capital | Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant.
    • Los Angeles Times: "Estimable."
    • The Boston Phoenix: "A dense, sprawling, and compulsively updated clearing-house for arty goings-on across the Northeast."
    • Gloucester Times: "An enterprise whose spotlight is aimed eccentrically at the highlights, lowlights, interesting experiments and shenanigans of the arts world of New England. Surrounding the hard stuff is some sophisticated and very funny fluff."
    • Art Connect: "Cook covers so much ground that you get the feeling that he must be aware of everything that goes on in the New England art scene."
    • Thomas Garvey of The Hub Review: "A man better known for sweetness than snark."
    • Wikipedia: One of the "Notable art blogs."
    • Drawn & Quarterly blog: The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research is "the best coverage of the New England area art scene out there."
    • Modern Kicks: "When it comes to art in New England, the man sees everything. I don't even want to know what the mileage on his car is."
    • Joel Brown of HubArts: "Cook has been a veritable Woodward and Bernstein on the Rose."
    • Art Fag City: "The most detailed report [on the Rose Art Museum that] I’ve read thus far."
    • Online University Reviews: One of the "100 Best Scholarly Art Blogs."
    • Sara Agniel: "The Journal is worth adding to your regular reading list."
    • Caleb Neelon: "The best regional arts news source out there."
    • Yankee Magazine blog: The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research is one of the "Best Art Blogs in New England."
    • Ethan Ham: "Excellent."
    • Thomas Garvey of The Hub Review: "Thoughtful."
    • Geoff Edgers of the Exhibitionist: "Always compelling."
    • Boston Photography Focus: "Excellent overview and coverage of the breaking gallery news since the spring as it happened."
    • ArtSake: "Incisive analysis of the New England art scene."
    • Modern Kicks: "Greg Cook has continued to be on top of the story."
    • Anne Elizabeth Moore: "Has excellent taste, and is tracking the SHIT outta the local arts scene."
    • Boston Lowbrow: "Who would've thought Cook's unrivalled thoroughness of local gallery coverage would translate so well to investigative journalism."
    • Newcritics: "Cook gets it right."
    • Robert Castagna: Cook and The New England Journal of Aesthetic Research are the cause of, and solution to, all of Boston art criticism's problems.
    • Jon Petro: "Cook's review reads like a sophomoric attempt at art criticism."
    • Also our favorite footnote (see 32).

      Old News

    • “Anyone, from kids on up, understand when they look at my regalia and watch me dance that I come from a land of fresh water ponds and rivers as well as land alongside the ocean,” Annawon Weedon, a Pequot, Narraganset and Mashpee Wampanoag man residing in Massachusetts, tells Indian Country Today about his pow wow regalia. “Rather than ribbons and fabric I prefer to use the old materials such as porcupine quill, shell, natural dyes, and hand woven fabrics. I watched my dad break the pattern of emulating western styles, a pow wow style that spoke of Native pride but didn’t show who we are as individual tribes.”


    • Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts offers African American art tour. Color Magazine reports: “The objects are not exhibited together, but rather spread out in the various galleries of the wing, which makes it a bit of a scavenger hunt, so the tips [audio host and director of the National Center of Afro-American Artists Barry] Gaither gives you are extremely helpful. Pay attention. Although, there’s no right or wrong way to take the tour, the multimedia guide takes some getting used to.”


    • Stolen painting of tiger recovered in Fall River! Previously.


    • Dan Hirsch, formerly of Boston’s MFA and Emerson College, is named curator of performances and public programs at Michigan State’s Broad Art Museum, which is lead by Michael Rush, former director of Brandeis’s Rose Art Museum.


    • “Japanese Masterpieces from The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston” on view at the Tokyo National Museum in Japan through June.


    • “You would have to travel to Rome to see such a monumental and impressive marble sculpture,” said curator Christine Kondoleon tells the MetroWest Daily News’ Chris Bergeron as a 13-foot tall ancient Roman statue arrived at Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts on March 20. “As in ancient Rome, MFA visitors will be awestruck by the physical presence of the gods and the power of the empire.” The statue is expected to go on public display April 9. More here.


    • $200 reward offered for return of Anthony Ferrao’s mural of a snarling tiger, which went missing in Fall River, Massachusetts.


    • “Cubist Opens Expanded Research and Development Facility” in Lexington, Massachusetts.


    • Jean Ceas leaves white dove sculptures around Providence “hoping to inspire peace with anyone who happens to find them.”


    • Boston Museum of Fine Arts acquires 2,000-year-old, 13-foot-tall Roman marble of Juno, which has been outdoors on the Brandegee Foundation property in Brookline for years. “The museum calls Juno the largest classical sculpture in the U.S. and pursued the acquisition for five years before buying it last spring for a seven-figure sum largely funded by an anonymous donor,” The Wall Street Journal reports.


    • MIT economics professor Jonathan Gruber, whom Paul Krugman once called “one of the three or four top health care economists in the nation,” is apparently looking to publish one of the top three or four most boring comic books in the nation: “Health Care Reform: What It Is, Why It’s Necessary, How It Works.” Try to top that, doodlers!


    • Matolcsy Arts Center in Norway, Maine, seeking $300,000 grant to fund repairs. “Town Manager David Holt said the art center’s architect has advised him that unless something is done with the building soon, it may be lost,” the Sun Journal reported.


    • Boston firm TurningArt is like a Netflix for art, you know, like when Netflix was cool.


    • RISD have extended school president John Maeda’s contract through June 30, 2015, despite faculty voting no confidence in him a year ago.


    • “He just liked to take the pictures of me,” Eleanor Callahan told us during a visit to a show of her late husband Harry’s photos of her at RISD in 2008. She died of cancer in Atlanta today at 95. And the New York Times obituary quotes from our interview with her. “In every pose. Rain or shine. And whatever I was doing. If I was doing the dishes or if I was half asleep. And he knew that I never, never said no. I was always there for him. Because I knew that Harry would only do the right thing. I never had any fear. Harry could do whatever he wanted with me and my body.”


    • Police at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts “are looking for a woman who allegedly punched a student journalist in the face for her pro-gay marriage editorial.”


    • Susan Hockfield, who has been president of Massachusetts Institute of Technology since 2004, announced that she plans to step down. She is the Cambridge school’s first woman president.


    • How to stave off public transit cuts threatened for Boston region? Blue Mass Group: “Stop wasting tax dollars on corporate welfare to Hollywood.” UniversalHub explains: “The amount of a tax break Tom Cruise gets when he makes a movie here almost equals the cost of keeping [Boston] commuter rail service running on weekends and after 10 p.m.”


    • “Tom’s a very good artist, and I look forward to seeing him come back into view. But it will take a body of work that will snap people’s heads around again,” Robert Storr says of Massachusetts artist Tom Friedman on the occasion of his show at Luhring Augustine in New York.


    • Wall Street Journal: “Videogames have long been assailed for their violent themes and gruesome imagery. But a small slice of players has embraced a new strategy: not killing. They are imparting real-world morals on their virtual-world characters and completing entire games on a ‘pacifist run’—the term for beating a blood-and-guts adventure without drawing any blood.” Also from On the Media.


    • Former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling’s video game “Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning” is “one of the finest action role-playing games yet made,” according to The New York Times. Does this mean that government help of business pays off?


    • “This is the way I played as a child, with my blocks and toys,” Hartford photographer Walter Wick, creator of the “Can You See What I See?” kids books, and co-creator with Jean Marzollo of the “I SPY” series, said of his exhibit at the Bruce Museum in Connecticut. “When I ran out of blocks, I used a kitchen stool, deli tubs.”


    • Major review of Boston’s Rachel Perry Welty in New York Times: “To those who don’t know much about recent art, her work may seem clever, inventive and poignant. If you’re familiar with contemporary currents, however, it feels more like a competent synthesis of recent trends and often conjures bolder works by other artists.” The show originated at DeCordova and is now in New Jersey.


    • LA’s Mike Kelley died Jan. 31 after “apparent suicide.”


    • For the 75th anniversary of the publication of Dr. Seuss’s “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street,” reporter travels to the real Mulberry Street in Springfield, Massachusetts, that inspired it. Now it’s “a shabby place with boarded-up houses, an addiction treatment center and drug dealers.”


    • “Meet One Of Boston’s Fearlessly Fierce Artists: Autumn Ahn.”


    • Anne Pasternak studied art history at UMass Amherst before going on to be president and creative director of New York public art producer Creative Time.


    • “It was like something out of a Chaucer tale,” said the founder of a New York scavenger hunt company that plans to offer a nudie tour of Boston’s MFA. “I made a joke about it to myself, and I said, ‘When people think of nudity in art, it appears in more ways than a statue of Venus with no arms.’ ”


    • A federal judge has ordered a prayer banner removed from Cranston High School West auditorium after five decades after a lawsuit brought by a 16-year-old student and the Rhode Island branch of the American Civil Liberties Union. “The Government must not appear to take sides on issues of religious beliefs” U.S. District Court Judge Ronald Lagueux wrote in his Jan. 11 ruling. “The purpose of the prayer banner was clearly religious in nature” and “No amount of debate can make the school Prayer anything other than a prayer, and a Christian one at that.” The case has sparked numerous threats of violence against the student, and for now the school district has covered the banner but not removed it.


    • “My mother was an artist, and I guess it was just always in me. [I] started drawing as a child, then I started painting,” says Tom Stanford, who opened Ladybird’s Gallery in Lancaster, Massachusetts, in December. It’s named after his aging dog and features his own paintings and sculptures in a style he’s dubbed “Subtractionalism.”


    • Curtains Without Borders documents historic painted stage curtains across New England.


    • Thomas Adams donates nearly 300 photos to the New Hampshire Institute of Art in Manchester.


    • Three paintings reported stolen from Salty Dog Gallery on Mount Desert Island, Maine.


    • “While I think [Maine Governor Paul] LePage’s seizing the [Maine Labor History] mural was ethically and legally despicable, I have to point out that he actually increased funding for the Maine Arts Commission. Bizarre as it sounds, that is actually the feather in his job-creation hat,” writes The Portland Press Herald’s Daniel Kany.


    • Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum in Exeter, Rhode Island, wins $10,000 grant to support a collaborative project with Narragansett artist Allen Hazard.


    • Boston Mayor Thomas Menino on MFA director Malcolm Roger’s push back against the city’s demand that tax-exempt nonprofits voluntarily pay more to the city in lieu of taxes: “Eighty-eight percent of the [institutions] are participating in the program. It’s unfortunate that Malcolm doesn’t want to be part of the city and wants to have his own empire.”


    • Artinfo endorses Jon Huntsman as the most arts-friendly 2012 Republican presidential candidate. As opposed to Mitt Romney, who aims to cut funding for the NEA and NEH by half.


    • Looking for a more lucrative career than art, MassAt alum Brook Aldrich ends up caring for capuchins at Brit monkey sanctuary.


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