Opinion
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MFA Pledges $500,000 for Diversity
Settlement Negotiated by Attorney General
By: - May 11th, 2020There were incidents of racism when a school group visited the Museum of Fine Arts on May 16, 2019. Attorney General Maura Healey has negotiated an agreement between the Museum of Fine Arts and Boston’s Helen Y. David Leadership Academy. The settlment comes with an apology as well as a commitment of $500,000 to address issues of racism
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The Mount On Line
Free Programming
By: - May 11th, 2020The Mount the home of Edit Wharton in the Berkshires announces a schedule of free programs. It is requires registration at EdithWharton.org.
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Victoria Bond at the Cutting Edge
Composer, Conductor and Musical Polymath
By: - May 10th, 2020Victoria Bond was born to be a musician. Her grandfather was a composer and conductor. Her father was an operatic bass, and her mother, a concert pianist. She found the piano herself. When her kindergarten teacher scolded her mother for pushing Bond too hard, her mother explained that she was trying to hold her back, but could not.
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How Jan Fontein Stabilized the MFA
From Curator of Asiatic Art to Director in 1975
By: - May 17th, 2020Because of the Raphael Incident, Perry T. Rathbone. was forced out as director of the Museum of Fine Arts in 1970. The board president, George Seybolt, who ousted Rathbone, then passed over acting director, Classical curator, Cornelius Vermeule, to unilaterally appoint a dark horse candidate, Merrill Rueppel. That ended with a curatorial coup from which Asiatic curator, Jan Fontein, emerged as acting director in 1975. He calmed troubled waters and acccomplished much through 1987. From April 1983, this is the first of two transcribed interviews.
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Spring Awakening
A Time to Plant
By: - May 18th, 2020Hostas, bleeding hearts, astilbe, ligularia, snakeroot, spirea, lying dormant (yin) for the winter and now bursting forth (yang) as the seasonal change urges them on. They have not spent the winter “thinking” about this; they have simply done it. The Japanese red lace leaf maple gave it not a thought when buds peaked out and began to open. It just happened.
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MFA's Jan Fontein Two
Addressing Issues of Racism in 1984
By: - May 21st, 2020In 1983 the Museum of FIne Art organized a traveling exhibition A New World: Masterpieces of American Painting: 1760-1910. It toured the Corcoran Gallery of Art and Grand Palais in Paris, as well as being shown at the MFA. Artists and members of Boston's African American community protested that the exhibition did not include artists of color. In this 1984 interview former MFA director, Jan Fontein, discussed negotiatons to include the 19th century artist Henry Osawa Tanner. We also covered gaps in 20th century European and American art.
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Robert S. Cox UMass Archivist at 61
Built on Activism and Papers from W.E.B. Du Bois to Ellsberg
By: - May 21st, 2020Robert S. Cox, head of Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) at the UMass Amherst Libraries for the past 16 years, died May 11 after an extended illness. He was 61 years old.
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Art for TB-Aids Then. Covid-19 Now
Linda Troeller Creates Inspired Pandemic Art Again
By: - May 29th, 2020Linda Troeller exhibited in 2018 at the Griffin Museum in Winchester. Her earlier work focused on TB and AIDS. The Berkshires were a haven for TB patients when the disease was out of control. North Adams had a sanitarium. Gaylordsville was home of a sanitarium recognized nation-wide. Eugene O'Neill spent time there. Now Troeller looks at a new pandemic.
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Hancock Shaker Village
A Pledge
By: - Jun 05th, 2020Since the late 18th century, the Shakers have embraced individuals of all racial and cultural backgrounds as equals – including black, brown, and indigenous. We are a museum, not Shakers – but as a museum and in keeping with the historic Shaker values of equality and justice, we are appalled by what we see before our eyes across America.
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Translating Movies into Opera
Why Operatic Movies Fail on Stage
By: - Jun 07th, 2020It is tempting for current composers of new opera to use films as a jumping off place. In two recent efforts, the creative artists miss the strength of the film's story arc and flatten their effort to create opera. Marnie at the Metropolitan Opera (and English National Opera) and Breaking the Waves (Opera Philadelphia) both overlook the strengths which provide drama in the films on which they are based.
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Tuesdays with Woodie King on Theatre
Founder of New Federal Theatre Raps with Talent
By: - Jun 09th, 2020New Federal Theatre is fifty years young and going strong. Even in this time of lock down, its founder, Woodie King Jr. persists. On Tuesdays at 3 during June he is discussing theatre with various artists. Not only are these captivating afternoons a superb introduction to aspirants in theatre and the performing arts, they show King at his best, drawing out talent and showing the path for others to follow.
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Water and Stillness
Go With the Flow
By: - Jun 11th, 2020Forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves. It is not for the sake of those we forgive; it is for our own sake. We take our anger and disappointment out of our backpack and toss it away. We stop carrying it with us, get unstuck from the past, and bring ourselves into the present.
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Spa Journeys for Astral Travelers
What A Trip
By: - Jun 10th, 2020Canyon Ranch may be just down the road for Berkshireites, but in the time of Covid, it's as inaccessible as the moon. Jessica Robinson suggests how to satisfy a spa yearning safely.
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Woodie King Jr. Looks for Leroy Jones
Rapping with Artists on Zoom
By: - Jun 18th, 2020Woodie King Jr.'s Rapping with Artist Series continues with a discussion of Larry Muhammed's acclaimed "Looking for Leroy." Director Petronia Paley and the playwright join King in a lively discussion of the play, one of the best Zoom theatrical pieces,
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The American Robot: A Cultural History
Book by Dustin A. Abnet
By: - Jun 24th, 2020Robots are with us, in fact, for the future and in decades of industry and popular culture. Dustin A. Abnet, assistant professor of American studies at Cal State Fullerton, takes us on a serious tour of robots in American industry and culture in his new book, The American Robot: A Cultural History.
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Daniel Chester French and Minute Man's Model
All in the Family
By: - Jun 25th, 2020Isaac Davis, Captain of the Acton troops was the model for the Minute Man. He was the first officer killed on April 19, 1775. The statute is placed on the ground on which he died.
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ATCA Statement of Action
Critics Support Anti-Racist Organization
By: - Jun 27th, 2020While Broadway and American Theatre are closed from now until whenever It is a time of reflection, accountability and change. The American Theatre Critics Association acknowledges but does not codone and pledges to end instance of racism by some of our members. Moving forward ATCA will strive to be an anti-racist organization that embraces diversity and inclusion.
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Lawrence Brownlee from Home on Being Black
A Formidable Tenor Speaks Openly About race
By: - Jun 29th, 2020Lawrence Brownlee sang a two-part concert at the Park Avenue Armory in 2017. In the Officer's Room he performed the bel canto arias we have come to associate with him. He is entirely comfortable. And he is sure that Bellini would welcome him, black or not, in any role. He moved to the Veteran's Room for the second part of the program. There he performed pop songs, gospel and folk. He was less comfortable in the more relaxed atmosphere. Now with downtime he discusses race.
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Northeastern University Restricts Access to AAMARP
African American Master Artists in Residency Program Founded in 1978
By: - Jul 06th, 2020During the pandemic Northeastern University has restricted access to artists in its historic African American Master Artists in Residency Program. It was founded in 1978 by Dana C. Chandler, Jr. Speaking out against the university for its actions against AAMRP is Dana Chandler III the son of the founder,
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Belief and Stillness
Interconnectedness of All Things
By: - Jul 07th, 2020Anyone who has attended one of my lectures has heard me talk about our connection to everything and everyone everywhere. In order for us to be in this moment together – – my writing, your reading – – everything that has happened since the beginning of time everywhere had to happen precisely as it did. Otherwise, we would not be together today.
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Streaming from Aix-en-Provence
Saariaho, Sellars, Rattle and Kožená
By: - Jul 07th, 2020Aix en Provence is offering a digital festival to those of us who can't enter France. Their selection of recitals, conversations and opera performances is intriguing and invites.
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Photographer Joseph Podlesnik
About Provisional Painting
By: - Jul 11th, 2020In photography and painting perspective has often been the main visual tool that connects the human presence to the here and now which becomes place. The image created by the handheld camera establishes ipso facto a tight bond via the picture plane on the back of the camera to the environment. If it is parallel to the subject matter or at an angle to it, the way the eye is moved by the image can be quite different.
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Good Dog Foundation Provides Helping Dogs
Berkshires Benefit from Canines
By: - Aug 03rd, 2020The Good Dog Foundation: Helping Humans Heal For more than 30,000 years dogs have been providing companionship and loyalty to humans. No wonder they are called ‘man’s best friend.’ Residents of the Berkshires benefit from the Good Dog Foundation. It provides Certified Therapy Dog visits to Fairview Hospital in Great Barrington and Crossroads Center for Enrichment in Pittsfield.
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Tending to the Garden
Cutting Back Perennials
By: - Aug 16th, 2020I have begun cutting back the perennials in the meditation garden that have passed for the season. Bleeding hearts, ligularia, lilies, with hostas not far behind. It is the way of things, the time of season. The butterfly bushes have presented their seed pods, and I’ve collected them for drying.
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What Joe Thompson Means to Northern Berkshire County
The Daunting Legacy of MASS MoCA
By: - Aug 22nd, 2020Joe Thompson graduated from Williams College in 1981. As founding director of MASS MoCA he has been here ever since. Stepping down in October he will sever ties next summer. Between now and then he will plan the next move. Other than some loose ends his remarkable work here is complete. Magnificently so.
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