BOSTON — Before 1968, when Philip Guston more or less began working on a new body of work that would define his late career, it could be said of him, as it was of Lord Dartmouth by the poet William Cowper: this was a man “who wears a coronet and prays.”
Robert Moeller
Robert Moeller is an artist, writer, and curator. His writing has appeared in Artnet, Afterimage, Big Red & Shiny, and Art New England. He lives in Somerville, MA.
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Boston Art Prize Disappoints by Snubbing Local Artists
BOSTON — There is no actual historical evidence to support the idea that Jesús Malverde ever existed, and stories of Mexico’s “Robin Hood-like bandit” seem likely to have been fabricated over time, embellished, and then mainlined directly into the central nervous system of narco-culture thug life.
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In the Spotlight, Harvard’s Rothkos Don’t Shine
Cambridge, Mass. — There is a story that sometimes circulates through the art world claiming the reason some of Mark Rothko’s work has faded over time is because he bought his paint at Woolworth’s Department Store.
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Miami’s Margulies Collection Is Predictable but Idiosyncratic
MIAMI — The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse (foundered and operated by collector Martin Z. Margulies) is located in a 45,000-square-foot building that butts up against a highway and sits just across the street from a discount clothing store in Wynwood, the city’s graffiti-splattered hipster enclave.
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Harun Farocki and Antje Ehmann Arrive at Work
BOSTON — Two factory doors swing open and a rabble emerges. French workers literally stream out into the world in a seemingly choreographed departure after a long day at work.
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The Rose Art Museum Brings in the Big Guns
WALTHAM, Mass. — Back in 2009, Brandeis University announced that it would close its Rose Art Museum and sell off the entire collection, widely regarded as one of the best holdings of postwar and contemporary art in the country.
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Creating Art Inside a Disused Power Plant
SALEM, Mass. — In the late 1600s, beset by an inarticulate religious hysteria and the rigors of the New World, the people of Salem set about burning the witches in their midst. Hundreds of years later and under the sway of a far different kind of fervor, they turned their attention to burning coal. Both of these events wove themselves directly into the fabric of this small New England town’s history.
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Social Practice for Domestic Workers: The NannyVan
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Recently, I watched as a group of artists and activists stood outside the main branch of the Cambridge Public Library beside the brightly colored NannyVan, talking to a steady stream of nannies about their rights and the obligations of their employers.
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For “Craftivists,” Hoops Spring Eternal
The NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament is slowly winding down. On another front, the New Craft Artists in Action (NCAA) are basketball fanatics of a different sort. The collective, based in Boston but with tentacles stretching out across the world, is crafting exuberant variants of hand-stitched basketball nets and hanging them on hoops everywhere.
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Sleepwalking Through Artistic Controversy
WELLESLEY, Mass. — A sculpture called “Sleepwalker” by the artist Tony Matelli, depicting a rather ordinary white man clad in just his underpants, arms outstretched, seemingly in search of a middle-of-the-night fix, lurches out into the Wellesley College campus space.
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Artists and NFL Quarterbacks: A Brief Guide
The 2014 Super Bowl, also known as Super Bowl XLVIII, will be held on Sunday, February 2 at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. What’s that got to do with art? As it turns out, there are certain distinct parallels between the high-profile athletes who patrol the chalky gridiron and the art stars who exhibit in the chalky white enclaves that patrol the art world.
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The Persuasive Paintings of a Shamanistic Yenta
SOMERVILLE, Mass. — The idea that a work may be finished before some mysterious visual and artistic calculus is complete tends toward the blasphemous. And, with a shrug of the shoulders, to simply imply that you are finished with a painting or drawing when you don’t want to work on it anymore — well, that’s just how Amy Sillman rolls …
