The Arts & Entertainment world is a many-splendoured thing in Western Mass, Southern VT, and North Eastern NY. What are you're interested in? Send an e-mail to arts@greylockglass.com.
“At some point I realized the fractured self is the true self, and that to go by the script society gives, telling you that you only have this one road that you can go down, is actually the antithesis of the American dream.
Trenton Doyle Hancock, Interview with Katy Henriksen, in the Creative Independent, 2017
viewed 03/07/19
Before the doors leading into the CenterStage open at the ’62 Center for Theatre and Dance, audience members waiting to see The Last Days of Judas Iscariot are invited to form lines behind three candle-bearers. We are led into a solemn scene lit by a single streetlight, where we stand before a woman who is mourning the death of her child. Another figure sits behind her at a quiet distance. The mother talks about her own pain and the shock of losing a grown son coupled with the excruciating memory of how alone he was in the end. Is this Mary, mother of Jesus?
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The dance world has been slow to let go of certain stereotypes. Chief among them might just be that men shouldn’t dance en pointe, and that romantic love is best expressed by men and women dancing together.
Which is one of the reasons that Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo, the 45-year-old, New York City–based company of men in tights (and really, really large pointe shoes) has always been such a blast of fresh air. Not only are they game to get tarted up to play, often hilariously, all the women’s roles in classic ballets, but they also demonstrate serious dance chops that rouse the audience to standing ovation.
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![Enough Said, II,, Jane Hudson; acrylic on canvas, 24” × 30”, [source, the artist].](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/enough-said_sm.jpg?fit=2000%2C1632&ssl=1)
“Our hearing of colours is so precise … Colour is a means of exerting a direct influence upon the soul. Colour is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano with its many strings. The artist is the hand that purposely sets the soul vibrating by means of this or that key. Thus it is clear that the harmony of colours can only be based upon the principle of purposefully touching the human soul.”
Wassily Kandinsky
Jane Hudson is a pioneer. Not just any pioneer, but one who, for over 40 years, has assumed the mantel of courageous trailblazer. Jumping into digital media, a male dominated field, when it was in its gestational state, she contributed to video and performance being recognized as an art on par with painting, drawing, and sculpture. Hudson’s accomplishments are well documented. Grants ranging from the National Endowment for the Arts to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, to the George Gund Foundation to the Mass Cultural Council all acknowledged her brilliance as a video and performance artist.
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Akram Khan doesn’t just perform his dances; he lives them. In XENOS, which played to a packed audience on February 21 at the Williams College ’62 Center for Theatre and Dance, he isn’t just a formidable dancer, but also a skilled actor adept at storytelling through explosive movement, small gestures, and poignant moments of stillness.
Keep ReadingWhose war?
from Xenos, written by Jordan Tannahill
Whose fire?
Whose hand is this?
![Aurora Robson, Isla, 2014; Plastic debris (PET + HDPE), aluminum rivets, tinted polycrylic, and mica powder; [Source: Aurora Robson].](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/ISLA_featured.jpg?ssl=1)
Plastic. In most cases it is imperishable, non-biodegradable, and close to everlasting. It is so ubiquitous in our life that we barely notice how much we use. According to the New York Times article, The Immense, Eternal Footprint Humanity leaves on Earth: Plastics (7.1. 2018) by Tatianna Schlossberg, 5 – 13 million metric tons of plastic are dumped into the ocean each year, and since the 1950s, 4.9 billion metric tons is in landfills or spread throughout the environment. With these facts in mind, it is well worth a trip to Smith College Museum of Art to view, Plastic Entanglements: Ecology, Aesthetics, Materials organized by Pennsylvania State University’s Palmer Museum of Art.
Keep Reading![Vik Muniz, "Sarah Bernhardt from Rebus," 2010, digital C-print. Collection of the Palmer Museum of Art, 2011.25. [Source: Vik Muniz, courtesy of Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York].](https://i1.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Muniz.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1)
![Paul Feeley, 1910-196; A Girl With A Doll, in Works on Paper: A Decade of Collecting [source: Bennington Museum]](https://i0.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Girl-With-A-Doll-1.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1)
![Imo Nse Imeh, Ovation, mixed media/canvas, 2018; [Source: artist / Readywipe Gallery]](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Imo-Nse-Imeh_Ovation.jpg?fit=1200%2C1801&ssl=1)
“ To me, this new body of work symbolizes the challenging, yet beautiful journey down the path of healing, to transform the horror of unspeakable tragedy into a renewed sense of life and celebration, I wanted to make something new, I wanted it to be reflective of a dark past, but also hopeful for the future. It needed to be about healing and the celebration of Black boys.”
Imo Nse Imeh
Following a disturbing rash of racially motivated incidents at Westfield State University, Dr. Imo Nse Imeh, an associate professor at the college, launched a live multi media performance that reexamined the travesty of the death of 17 year old, Trayvon Martin. Using the span of Martin’s life, Dr. Imeh painted a large scale portrait of Trayvon Martin as a video taped performance that culminated in the destruction of the portrait in the final 17th hour of the show. This final hour mirrored the life of a 17 year old boy whose life was cut short for no other reason other than racial hatred. Over the course of the next year, Dr. Imeh created 17 new works, each one integrating fragments from Trayvon Martin’s portrait saved from the first performance.
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![Imo Nse Imeh, Ovation, mixed media/canvas, 2018; [Source: artist / Readywipe Gallery]](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Imo-Nse-Imeh_Ovation.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1)
![Emily Eveleth, Big Pink, 2016, oil on canvas, [Source: the Artist and Danese/Corey, New York] on view: Like Sugar, Tang Teaching Museum](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Big-Pink.jpg?resize=358%2C465&ssl=1)
School vacations are upon us! In addition, a welcome sign winter will not last forever-new spring exhibits are beginning to pop up everywhere! You can drive within an hour and view a recently opened exhibit composed of internationally renowned artists whose work has focused on sugar, both the sweet and sour aspects, at the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs to a beautiful group exhibit, Be Mine, presenting the many interpretations of love curated by Julie Torres at LABspace in Hillsdale, New York, or stay in your own back yard and finally try out the free snowshoes at the Clark Art Institute.
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![Terry Winters, Untitled (2), 1999; gouache on paper, 44 1/4 X 30 1/2 inches; private collection [Source: Matthew Marks Gallery]](https://i0.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/48c88952a8ec7dfbd7041827a6e46bee86e8c132.jpg?fit=900%2C1292&ssl=1)
“I saw it in New York,” or “I saw it in the city” is an often-heard response when an exhibit of well established artists come to the mountains and valleys of western Massachusetts. It happens all the time at MASS MoCA. My response generally is, “Well, did you see it in a gallery the size of a football field? Could you look down on it from above?” One such show, slightly to the east of us, is now on view at the University of Massachusetts Amherst Fine Arts Center, which houses the University Museum of Contemporary Art.
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![Terry Winters, Untitled (2), 1999; gouache on paper, 44 1/4 X 30 1/2 inches; private collection [Source: Matthew Marks Gallery]](https://i0.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/48c88952a8ec7dfbd7041827a6e46bee86e8c132.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1)
![Paul Feeley, 1910-196; A Girl With A Doll, in Works on Paper: A Decade of Collecting [source: Bennington Museum]](https://i0.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Girl-With-A-Doll-1.jpg?fit=2635%2C3343&ssl=1)
Supposedly, February is the off-season for cultural happenings in the Berkshires and neighboring communities. Don’t believe it! From Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s incredible Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) in Troy, New York, to Bennington Museum in Bennington, Vermont, to Smith College Museum of Art’s opening exhibit, Plastic Entanglements, Ecology, Aesthetics, Materials, the breath, depth and diversity of our region knows no bounds. The above are, but a few of the incredible opportunities within an hour of north county to witness new, innovative art or fresh new discoveries of Vermont Folk sculpture. Fortunately most of these exhibits are on view for at least a month and some through the spring season. Plan ahead and enjoy!
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![Sarah Sutro, Landscape Composite #6, 2015. Acrylic on Canvas [source: Gallery 51]](https://i2.wp.com/www.greylockglass.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/32893685478_001de878c7_k.jpg?fit=2048%2C395&ssl=1)
Overwhelmed by large museums? Would you like to take a moment to look at artwork, but you don’t want to pay admission or dedicate an entire afternoon? There is an answer. MCLA Gallery 51, 51 Main Street, North Adams, Mass. Now on view is Colour and Form: Beauty in Abstraction.
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Keep Reading“My interest in browning the white cube — by building with adobe bricks, making brown bodies present — is a response to entering traditional art spaces and not seeing myself reflected. This has been the case not just physically, in terms of the whiteness of those spaces, but also in terms of the histories of art they uphold”
Rafa Esparza, ArtForum, November 21, 2017
