Twenty five years ago, the artists were setting up in a hurricane. Linda Kaye-Moses had come from Pittsfield with her silver pendants, and she was putting up her booth with her husband, Evan Soldinger. She creates jewelry in metalwork — talismans in metal clays and bright enamels.
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Art in the Berkshires – 2019
As the leaves turn, artists are opening their studios, and museums and galleries open new shows …
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Acclaimed artist Cauleen Smith talks on the Time of Now at Mass MoCA (BTW column)
A young man and a young woman stand on a river bank in Cameroon. They are barefoot in swim suits, arguing passionately about music. She wants to listen to songs like the Beatles in her own way, and play them with her own sound, and he wants to compose his […]
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Berkshire Historical Society explores Herman Melville’s attic
The desk set is made of green glass with a pattern of dark leaves. The label names it Tiffany. Erin Hunt read it in fascination and mulled over these fine opalescent boxes. They would hold ink and paper, stamps, pens and blotter ends. And what would someone write with them, […]
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A writer’s library reveals Edith Wharton at home
On the flyleaf of a book of Japanese poetry translated into French, penciled handwriting tries out haikus. Haiku would have been a less familiar form in the early years of the 20th century, when the owner of the book sat here in an arm chair, playing with ideas. The handwriting is Edith Wharton’s. […]
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Ida O’keeffe: Clark Art Institute recovers a vanished Modern artist
She is making a monotype print with a clothes iron. At the end of a long day, she works by the light of the desk lamp. Her hands are smudged with ink. She is half painting and half sculpting a bare hill crosshatched in dusk and shadow with a figure standing […]
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Renoir touches the body with light at the Clark Art Institute
Pierre Auguste Renoir is known as a painter of optimism. His scenes brim with light and color. Adriatic blue water laps close enough to touch. Men and women sit at cafe tables, laughing under lime trees and lanterns. Couples waltz outdoors on warm nights. He is one of the founders […]
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Albany Berkshire Ballet revives around A Midsummer Night’s Dream
It’s full moon in the deep summer woods. Puck is out tonight, laughing invisibly with anyone who feels an unexpected rush when the air stirs. It smells warm and sweet and green before the rain, and the ferns are shoulder high. And lovers are looking for each other in the […]
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‘Suffering from Realness’ at Mass MoCA
A woman stands in sunlight, and she looks out with a level, intelligent and sombre gaze at a world where a few generations ago she would have been enslaved. A soldier returns from duty in Afghanistan to face people who turn away on an American street. At Mass MoCA, 16 […]
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Honey on the roof: Clark Art Institute cultivates bees and meadows
The scent of honey and wood smoke is as thick as the warm, dense hum. The worker bees are active today. A few hot days have come after cool, wet weeks, and the wild primrose are blooming in the pastures. David Thayer gently lifts a small wood and mesh box to […]
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