Opinion
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June
From Town to Country
By: - Jun 17th, 2015Migrant workers. The annual move from loft in North Adams to house in Adams. Summer and winter just minutes from each other. Odd to some makes perfect sense. Seasonal chores of planting flower and vegetable beds. Hopes of harvest and bouquets in the house. Glorious life in the bucolic Berkshires.
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Basment Tapes
Tales from the Crypt of the MFA
By: - Jun 16th, 2015During my recent book launch at The Mount my friend private art dealer Jim Jacobs regaled playwright Mark St. Germain with stories of our time together as interns in the Museum of Fine Arts back in the 1960s. At Mark's suggestion this has now inspired a suite of poems gathered as The Basement Tapes. It is my first attempt to create an extended work an idea which previously was suggested by my poet friend and mentor Stephen Rifkin
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ICA Boston to Survey Black Mountain College
Leap Before You Look: Black Mountain College 1933–1957
By: - Jun 16th, 2015When the rise of the Third Reich led to closing the Bauhaus in 1933 the architect Walter Gropius and his wife the weaver. artist Anni regrouped in rural North Carolina to establish a small experimental outpost for advanced art and design Black Mountain College. The faculty and students were intended to build their dorms and studios as well as grow their food and raise livestock. Never having a solid endowment the experiment ended in 1957. Gropius went on to Harvard and the rest of the faculty scattered. The impact on post war American arts was indelible. Organized by former curator Helen Molesworth this promises to be one of the most ambitious and informative exhibitions of the fall season. It will be on view in Boston Oct. 10, 2015 to Jan. 24, 2016 and then travel to LA and Columbus, Ohio.
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Hippy
Stranger Than Fiction
By: - Jun 15th, 2015Old men in the waiting room comparing aches and pains. First thing in the morning appointment for cortisone shot. Checking e mail. Note from a colleague updated on postponed hip replacements.
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Francesco Clemente's Encampment at Mass MoCA
With Jim Shaw to January, 2016
By: - Jun 13th, 2015During the Pluralism of the 1980s the Italian born artist Francesco Clemente was a part of the neo expressionist movement. Having recently reinvented himself the artist who lives in New York and India had a series of glitzy decoratve tents fabricated by artisans. The artist has painted the interiors with provocative, fluid, naive narratives. This imajor installtion in Mass MoCA's vast Building Five has been paired with the cartoon inspired, theatrical scaled paintings of the populist artist./ musician conceptualist Jim Shaw. The work is obviously fun and accessible but skates on thin ice.
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The Mount
Booklaunch at Edith Wharton's Berkshire Home
By: - Jun 10th, 2015On a perfect June evening a booklaunch, my first, on the terrace of Edith Wharton's The Mount in Lenox. Witty exchanges with director Susan Wissler. Reading Gonzo poems from Shards of Life. Elegant gathering with Berkshire friends and neighbors, artists, writers and citizens of the world. Superb food and fine wine. Guests exploring the formal gardens. Signed a ton of books.
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Eric Rudd Announces for North Adams Mayor
Artist/ Developer Runs Against Incumbent Alcombright
By: - May 15th, 2015After establishing the former Contemporary Artists Center in the Beaver Mill the artist, Eric Rudd, developed the artists/ loft Eclipse Mill. He is now announcing his second campaign for mayor. The first some time ago was against John Barrett III and now he opposes Mayor Dick Alcombright. It is speculated that Barrett, who after being defeated sat on the city council, may join the race. The artists and potential voters who Rudd appeals to tipped the balance when Alcombright defeated Barrett. In fact he blamed them for running him out of a generation spanning dominance of North Adams politics. This could indeed be interesting.
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Northern Berkshires Blockbuster Arts Summer
From Warhol and Wilco to van Gogh and Inge
By: - May 14th, 2015Now in his final weeks as director of the Clark Art Institute Michael Conforti hosted a media event promoting a blockbuster season for Northern Berkshire County. There were presentations by Joe Thompson for Mass MoCA, Tina Olsen for the Williams College Museum of Art, and Mandy Greenfield for the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Notably absent from the media event were North Adams based arts presenters Downstreet, The Eclipse Mill Gallery, The Rudd Museum of Art and the fall annual Williamstown Film Festival.
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John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden in Metabookâ„¢
New Digital Book Publisher Puts a New Spin on a Modern Classic
By: - Apr 03rd, 2015The publishing conundrum. How to attract readers tied to their mobile devices and induce them to read a book. Ken Siman and his partners Christian and Benjamin Alfonsi have produced a packed multimedia edition of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil for iphones and ipads. Is this the answer to book reading in the 21st century?
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Where Does Grand Opera Fit in the 21st Century
Peter Gelb is Not Answering the Question
By: - Mar 19th, 2015The New Yorker editor and Columbia's Bloomberg professor of business journalism, James Stewart, splendidly describes internal negotiations at the Met last summer as Peter Gelb, the general manager, tried to cut salaries and expenses by 16 % and the orchestra, chorus, stagehands and other smaller unions struggled for their lives. On the larger issue of the Met's survival at all, Stewart falls short.
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A Tale of Two Halides
Empty Calorie, Mineral Deficient, Low Fiber, Nutritionally \Non-dense Food
By: - Mar 03rd, 2015Among other insights our science correspondent reveals that "Forty and fifty years ago, Iodine, in the form of Sodium Iodate, was routinely added to American bakery products, both as a dough conditioner and a nutritional supplement. Then, of course because it was cheaper, Big Food started adding Bromates instead. These not only contain no Iodine, but are also capable of displacing it. Our FDA likes to say that all the Bromates (which are banned in the EU and UK) in dough will become the less-toxic Bromides in the processes of flour “ripening,†rising, and baking.'" It is likely that you didn't know that.
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How We Live
Thinking of Yeats
By: - Feb 18th, 2015Our friend the poet Stephen Rifkin often sends insightful and provocative e mails. It has been an ongoing and absorbing dialogue. I asked if he could expand a recent one into an op ed piece. Looking inward he was inspired by Yeats.
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Euro English
Toward Universal Language
By: - Feb 09th, 2015The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.
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Super Bowl Inspired Fast Eddy
Arts Critic Reveals Passion for Sports
By: - Jan 31st, 2015As a critic and journalist New York based Edward Rubin, known to friends and colleagues as Fast Eddy, has a finger in many pies. On the eve of the Super Bowl he reveals a deep and abiding love of sports. Much of this passion was inherited from his sporting father. Hey, who knew?
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The Clark and Mass MoCA Stiff Locals
Negligible Off Season Free Admissions
By: - Dec 18th, 2014As of January One the Clark will no longer be free during the off season. It is offering token free days but adult admission is full freight at $20. Add another $10 to see special exhitions. Which is still more generous than Mass MoCA which has a single annual free day. It sends the wrong PR and marketing message to the local community. What price can you put on being a welcoming good neighbor?
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Words Matter
The Value of Education
By: - Nov 16th, 2014People who make money are successful. They are sometimes well educated, and sometimes not, but they are smart. They are smart enough to be successful in the way most of us value success.
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Boston Mayah Walsh on the Arts
Reply to Larry Stark
By: - Sep 16th, 2014Veteran Boston theatre critic Larry Stark wrote an open letter to Boston Mayor Martin Walsh. He stated his disappointment that campaign promises to the arts community were soon forgotten. We posted his original letter which is linked in this reply from the Mayor's spokesperson longtime arts advocate Joyce Linehan.
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Unexamined Life Isn't Worth Living
But Not By IQ Tests
By: - Sep 09th, 2014Schools used to assign children to classes based on their IQ test scores. Then schools decided it was better for children to be in heterogeneous, or mixed IQ, classes. They would get a better feel for life because many people are not so fast. Now experts may be reconsidering. It is one of the truisms of fashion, and there are intellectual fashions, too, that they change. Here Rifkin again rebuts Zaig.
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Outside The Machine
Waxing Philosophical
By: - Sep 03rd, 2014There has been a lively response to the provocative series of think pieces by the Berkshire artist David Zaig. Here the Berkshire poet Stephen Rifkin debates Zaig's contentions. They often sit at the same table during weekly Monday night Chinese dinners in North Adams. Rifkin recently gave a poetry reading at the Rudd Art Museum where Zaig is currently exhibiting his work.
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Vaccination Followup
Poor Former Dr. Wakefield
By: - Aug 31st, 2014In this sidebar to the Vaccination Divide we discuss the contoversies surrounding the research of Dr. Andrew Wakefield who uncovered links between autism and a particular type of gut inflammation. Eventually his findings were discredieted and his liscense to practice medicine was revoked. But he is correct that aluminum toxicity is capable of doing real damage.
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Defining an Artist
Honorific vs. Generic
By: - Aug 30th, 2014Anyone who hangs a few pictures in a coffee shop is a self proclaimed artist or photographer. Is anyone who makes art an artist? Does posting comments to Facebook make one a critic? Does posting snap shots of your cat or kids qualify as art? Despite decades as a successful commercial and fine arts photographer the Berkshire based Benno Friedman, during an extensive interview, explains why he hestitates to call himself an artist.
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Open Letter to Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh
My Theatrical Response to Disaster in Ferguson
By: - Aug 29th, 2014Back in the day Larry Stark was the theatre critic for Boston After Dark which elided as The Boston Phoenix. He has covered theatre for decades currently with his website Theatre Mirror. Following up on campaign promises Stark in an open letter has questions for Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh. "To put it bluntly Mayor, I voted for you Only because I thought at the time that your commitment to The Arts was genuine."
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Exhibit in Grant Park Addresses Ferguson
Unspeakable Times Are Soothed by Chicago's Statues
By: - Aug 25th, 2014The figures are iron and aluminum, but to me and many others they stood for black and white. People of all colors are walking and seated in the Georg Solti Park in Grant Park, Chicago. These sculptures invite quiet contemplation of the state of race relations in this country this August.
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The Vaccination Divide
Exploring the Pros and Cons
By: - Aug 25th, 2014Faith based and other concerned parents have opted not to vaccinate their children. This can result in outbreaks in formerly widely preventable diseases. There are concerns that vaccinations may in fact induce dangerous side effects inluding an inclination for autism. Our science correspondent, a firm advocate of vaccination, explores the issues and risk factors.
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NY Times Zings Mass MoCA
Mixed Report on $25.4 Million from Commonwealth
By: - Aug 22nd, 2014Twelve days after breaking news the New York Times has reported on $25.4 million in Commonwealth funding for the $50 million renovation of the final phase of build out for Mass MoCA. While damning the museum with faint praise the Times drags up an eight year old controversy of a botched installation by Christoph Buchel. The reporter probed far and wide for on and off the record smears of the museum and its critical reputation.
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