The flute holds a long tone and turns it, and the sound flexes like a dancer. Two traditions are meeting here tonight from thousands of miles away.
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On a quest for the first signs of spring
Spring is here, they tell me — and I’m collecting signs of it avidly this year. Outside the porch window someone is calling, the quick jiminy-jiminy-jiminy I think may be a Carolina wren …
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Quilting thrives with a contemporary energy
From college dorms to quilt shops, an old New England artform is alive in the Berkshires, in patterns and textures from leaves and landscapes to contemporary abstract color.
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Printmaking fills the Berkshire hills with color
I’m at WCMA, after a morning at the new Sol LeWitt retrospective of silkscreens, aquatints and lithographs, sharing a quiet minute with Katsushika Hokusai’s Amida Waterfall …
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‘Strict Beauty’ reveals Sol LeWitt through his prints
If Sol LeWitt were alive today, would he be working with a programmer in fractal algorithms? Listening to the way he worked, it can be easy to imagine him experimenting in the digital age …
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A winter encounter at Field Farm
A porcupine was looking down at me. Six feet overhead, he or she (I couldn’t tell) was sitting on a limb spreading from a young tree …
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Close your eyes and feel the music
Glad rhythms — how can I describe the sound for you? Eight marimbas are cascading tones like summer rain. Within a few beats, most of the audience is on their feet.
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James Van der Zee envisions the Harlem Renaissance
Near his photography studio in Harlem, James Van Der Zee could have heard Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey sing the blues …
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When all the world’s a prism (February 9 newsletter)
Look southwest, toward the sun, and the whole hillside gleams with light. We’re not likely to see many days like this one — after an ice storm …
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Comfort food (for thought) in stormy weather
Mountain Meadow opens out in a long arc. It’s a warm day after these weeks of single digits, and the snow is soft underfoot, like wet sand on the tideline.
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