Arts section
If you’re a fan of PETER HELLER’ s best-selling books, it’ll be no surprise that he has amazing stories of high adventure, suspense and great beauty – which he tells with vividness and generous doses of good humor.
He was kind enough to stop by while he was in town for a very fun show, and talked about his adventures, his writing and………his connections to our community.
From military school to cartooning, to his early years in the NYC art world and onto teaching at Windham College, DAVID ROHN tells the story of his life through art and enjoying himself wherever he is.
Thanksgiving weekend, November 25, 26 and 27, promises to be a big weekend for Putney, Vermont. The Putney Craft Tour, Next Stage Arts Project and Sandglass Theatre have joined forces to promote “Thanksgiving Weekend of Arts”.
Ken Pick, one of the founders of the Putney Craft Tour says: “This will be a great cultural treat for visitors and locals alike. Not only will the craft tour be taking place during the day, but Next Stage Arts will offer an art exhibition— Elemental Abstractions Works on Paper by Joe Norris opening late afternoon on Saturday and Sandglass Theater will present, “A Rafter of Crankies”, with performances scheduled for Friday and Saturday nights.
The collaboration will provide an opportunity to create a bigger and better weekend to draw more people and bring a positive impact on area inns and restaurants and on our respective organizations,” says Pick. “We’re looking forward to welcoming visitors and arts lovers alike. And, with the Putney Craft tour beginning on Friday through Sunday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., the weekend offers perfect timing for visitors to enjoy all of the offerings.”
The Fine Arts Gallery at Landmark College will host an artist reception for the “Forest Composition” exhibit on Friday, November 11 from 5-7 p.m.
“Forest Composition” is a multimedia exhibition with works by Brantner DeAtley, Betsey Garand and Gina Siepel. The works by these three artists explore themes of nature and environment, our place within it and our human connection to it.
Landmark College Associate Professor of Fine Art and Gallery Director Samuel Rowlett says the exhibit is inspired by shinrin-yoku, the Japanese practice of “forest bathing”, and the health and wellness benefits of spending time interacting with the natural world and nature’s ability to counteract some of the effects of the “technostress” of our increasingly digital world.
Shoot the Moon Theater Company returns to live, in-person theater performances with a production of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” for its 2022 Annual Halloween Spectacular.
Shows take place Fridays and Saturdays, October 21-22 and October 28-29 at 7:30 p.m. in the Hooker-Dunham Theater & Gallery. General Admission is $13.00. Tickets can be purchased at the door or reserved in advance by calling 802-451-0523.
“Jekyll and Hyde” will be the company’s first production in front of a live audience since January 2020, according to Shoot the Moon’s Artistic Director Joshua Moyse. “We stayed in contact through COVID-19, did some online readings, and did a digital Halloween show in 2020,” he says. “We’ve mostly been waiting until the time was right to rev back up, and now is that time.”
I’m pleased to invite you to this free program at Brooks Memorial Library next Wednesday evening. This is a wrap-up of the Words Project, which has focused on Lucy Terry Prince, Royall and Mary Tyler, and Mary Wilkins Freeman, authors from the past, who lived in Guilford and/or Brattleboro. The Wednesday program serves as a prelude to this year’s Brattleboro Literary Festival, which runs from Thursday through Sunday.
Now we turn to a more recent author, poet William Mundell (1912-1997), lifelong resident of South Newfane. Both his life and his work are of interest. At 6 pm we’ll have our traditional roundtable discussion with his nephews and with Andy Burrows, who worked with the poet on publication of his first book, Hill Journey, by the Stephen Greene Press. We’ll tell you about Mundell’s life as not only a fine poet, but a painter, photographer, town official, ski area developer, State Highway Foreman, stone mason, house builder …. There will also be a small exhibit at the library of Mundell items.
The Landmark College Academic Speaker Series presents visual artist Destiny Palmer on Tuesday, September 27 at 5 p.m. in in the Brooks M. O’Brien Auditorium, located in the Lewis Academic Building.
The Boston-based artist will discuss her public art and studio-based practice that function as places to create dialogue and make space for investigation. Palmer will also share how her practice has ebbed and flowed to what it has become now, centered around color, abstraction and history.
Rocks, Paper, Scissors, a multimedia exhibit by six area artists, is now on view at All Souls Church in the West Village Meeting House through October 31.The public is invited to a reception on Saturday, September 24, 2 to 4 pm.
The exhibit, curated by Stuart Copans, focuses on Vermont rocks, both actual ones and those portrayed in works of art by Copans, Maisie Crowther, Don Fitzpatrick, Kip King, Steven Meyer, and Charles Siggins II, Rocks preserve the rich and elaborate patterns that waves and currents create on the floor of the ocean as well in mountain streams, where the water flows in curves and spirals that are reproduced in the flow of molten rock that solidifies to preserve the patterns of both flow and turbulence.
The Architecture + Design Film Series will kick-off its 10th season of free, monthly films shown in person simultaneously at 6:30 pm at 118 Elliot in Brattleboro, 118 Elliot Street, and at Burlington City Arts’ Contois Auditorium up north, on September 21, 2022 with “M.C. Escher: Journey to Infinity” (2019, Robin Lutz, 81 minutes, Netherlands, mostly English with some subtitles). Doors open at 6:15 pm. Film showings are free and open to all (masking is optional but appreciated) and are also available for virtual viewing all day through the A+D Film website at: www.adfilmseries.org.
The Brattleboro Arts Committee will meet on Tuesday, August 23, 2022 at 5:00pm in the Brooks Memorial Library Meeting Room.
ACWC is pleased to announce the grantees for this year’s Brattleboro Town Arts Fund (TAF) program. Ten community-focused creative initiatives were selected from a competitive field of proposals received in this third year of the TAF program.
“We saw so many amazing proposals this year- projects seeking to build community and connection, reach out across culture and experience, and inspire joy and healing through creative practice,” say ACWC chair and vice-chair Sharon Fantl and Chrissy Lee. “We’re thrilled to support this year’s grantees and to see new works, conversations, and visions emerge from these initiatives.”
Austin Rice talks about “leaning into the weirdness” of the new film he co-produced : Lil’ Balzac 2, which premieres at the Latchis Theater on August 5. He also tells us about growing up in Brattleboro, studying film, becoming a Town Rep, producing for BCTV, and his new family.
AGENDA
1. Convene, quorum check
2. Approve Minutes of June 28 Meeting
3. Introductions, Art Committee Members [10 mins]
4. Elect officers (Chair, Vice-Chair, and Clerk) [10 mins]
With the publication of her new book, “Thistlefoot”, we revisit our 2020 show with GennaRose Nethercott. “GennaRose Nethercott is a literary trickster god, “Thistlefoot shimmers with magic and mayhem,” says best-selling author Libba Bray. Check out the show to hear about GennaRose’s writing adventures and explorations on the road to winning the National Poetry Series Award.
The Sundog Poetry Center is thrilled to announce a summer afternoon of art, music and poetry, our signature AMP event, featuring poetry by Rage Hezekiah, Kerrin McCadden, and Partridge Boswell, music by Los Lorcas, and visual art by Liz Hawkes deNiord.
Rage Hezekiah is a Cave Canem, Ragdale, and MacDowell Fellow who earned her MFA from Emerson College. She is a recipient of the Saint Botolph Emerging Artist Award and she serves as Interviews Editor at The Common. Her forthcoming collection, Yearn, is a 2021 Diode Editions Book Contest winner. She is the author of Unslakable (Paper Nautilus Press, 2019) and Stray Harbor (Finishing Line Press, 2019). Rage’s poems have appeared in the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, The Cincinnati Review, The Colorado Review, and many other journals and anthologies. You can find more of her work at ragehezekiah.com.
Brattleboro, VT…. Brattleboro is home to many historic treasures, some large enough to grace the main street in town, others hidden gems that we need to seek out. The Estey Organ Museum is one of those pieces of history that is well worth a visit for many reasons. Tucked away in the company’s Old Engine House on Birge Street, it holds a century of local history that spread the Estey reputation far and wide.
The new season starts on May 21 in celebration of the museum’s 20th year and will be open to the public on Saturdays from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. through October. It is unique in that unlike what we’re used to in most museums, the hosts in this museum say to all visitors—adults and children alike—please touch; please sit down and play the organs. Visitors even have the opportunity of walking through a pipe organ to see how the mechanism works.
AGENDA
1. Convene, quorum check
2. [10 mins] Introductions, Intents of Art Committee Members, Announcements
3. [10 mins] Elect officers (Chair, Vice-Chair, and Clerk)
a. Motions on rotating positions terms per meeting, monthly?
b. Motions on remedying previous published AC meeting minute notes
Bellows Falls, VT (May 3, 2022)—Today, Bellows Falls designates the month of May as “May, Art Month in Bellows Falls,” a town-wide celebration to build awareness and appreciation of the arts and businesses throughout the town from May 9 through Memorial Day Weekend. May, Art Month in Bellows Falls will highlight the arts and the cultural community, as well as the entire town including local businesses, creative entrepreneurs, and artists.
“We will be highlighting artists, events, shops, and restaurants that contribute year-round to the vital and cultural richness and economic stability of the community,” says Robert McBride, founder, and director of The Rockingham Arts & Museum Project (RAMP).
The town of Hamelin has a rat problem, and there’s only one person who can help! CactusHead Puppets brings the story of The Pied Piper to life in this comedic, updated adaptation of the traditional folktale. Not only does the town find a musical solution to pest control, but the kids of Hamelin also teach the grownups a lesson about generosity. In the end, the townspeople all come together in celebration. Join puppeteers John and Megan Regan as they present this classic tale, told with multiple puppetry styles, and plenty of dancing rats! The show will run 40 minutes with an engaging question and answer session following the performance.
Come witness magic maker and puppeteer, Scotty Swan with Urban Wizards Academy March 12th at 11am and 2pm. Swan’s work is a unique blend of sleight-of-hand magic, puppetry and improvisation that is woven together in an exhilarating show that gets the audience up off its feet to become part of the performance. This show is for family audiences ages 6 to 12 and sure to be a thrilling delight for parents as well.
Scotty Swan is a well-regarded artist and teacher who has been performing throughout the region since 1999. His shows are a unique blend of comedy, magic, 80s pop culture references, silly puppets, amazing illusions and hysterical audience participation, that keep his audiences laughing.
