New Bedford Art Museum (12/2/2018)

Saturday, December 1, 2018
After we arrived in Providence, RI, we decided to check out some holiday activities downtown. The weather was mild and sunny, but promised to be rainy and cold tomorrow.

Celebrate Downcity ice sculpture of the
1928 National Industrial Bank Building
aka Superman Building, in Art Deco style
(oh, there's Katrina to the left!)

Providence Ice Rink in front of the former Union Station (1898, by
Stone, Carpenter & Willson in Neo-Renaissance style)

PVD Winter Lights Market: Inflatable sculptures
with the Superman Building in the background

Providence City Hall (1875-1878, by
Samuel J F Thayer in Second Empire Baroque style)
with a "natural-looking" lighted holiday tree

Back at Kyle and Katrina's place:

Part of Eclipse (Total My Heart) by Katrina

Eclipse detail with Katrina's signature "webbing"
that I find so mesmerizing

A fabric wall hanging made in India

Detail of the wall hanging with horizontal stitching

Bursting Forth by Katrina with minute details,
watercolor wash, and written word

Fade Into (Through) You (unfinished) by Katrina

Fade detail with Katrina's signature
butterflies and stylized "webbing"

Wow! Christmas cactus in bloom

Sunday, December 2, 2018

The chandelier in the foyer of Kyle & Katrina's
building with different types of bulbs (or no bulb)

It was a rainy day, so a good day for visiting art exhibits.
But first, a Roadside America attraction in New Bedford, MA!

The Whaleman aka the Angry Mariner
(1913, by Bela Lyon Pratt)

Also at the New Bedford Library was a statue of
Lewis Temple (1987, designed by James C Toatley),
a free black man and blacksmith who invented the
Temple Toggle Iron (1848), a pivot-head
harpoon that revolutionized the whaling industry

New Bedford Art Museum Members Exhibition:

Moths Drink the Tears (2018, by Katrina)

Moths Drink the Tears detail

Moths Drink the Tears detail

Red Octopus (2017, by Robert Sewell) paper sculpture

Red Octopus detail

Toe Shoes (2017, by Mary N Hurwitz)

Who Saved Who? Exhibit: a pigeon/
rock dove framed by bird control spikes!

Still in New Bedford, we went to the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Art Gallery for an exhibit on Black Spaces Matter: Celebrating New Bedford's Abolition Row, a neighborhood of African-Americans, black and white abolitionists, and former slaves including Frederick Douglass, where the interracial aspects of American cities may be studied. During the mid 19C whaling boom, there was a period of relative equality and tolerance, and the area had ties with the Underground Railroad.

Photos of Abolitionist Row architecture including Federal,
Greek Revival, Gothic Revival, early Italianate, and modest cottages

The Abolitionist Row Park will have benches
inspired by the Lewis Temple Toggle Iron (KSS)

The Bubbler Gallery!

After lunch, we drove back to Providence, RI, to the David Winton Bell Gallery at Brown University for its exhibit: Danny Lyon: The Only Thing I Saw Worth Leaving.

"Drawn from the David Winton Bell Gallery collection, the exhibition presents photographs from four of Lyon’s most significant series - Memories of the Southern Civil Rights Movement (1962-1964), The Bikeriders (1963-1966), The Destruction of Lower Manhattan (1966-1967), and Conversations with the Dead (1967-1968) - supplemented by films. Disparate though their subjects are, the photographs engage in dialogue with each other across time, space, and circumstances."

A Woman Confronts a Mob Abusing Demonstrators in
Downtown Atlanta (1963, from Memories of the
Southern Civil Rights Movement) (KSS)

Renegade's Funeral, Detroit (1963-1966, from The Bikeriders)

Radiator, the St George Building New York (1967,
from The Destruction of Lower Manhattan)

Texas Prison Rodeo, The Walls (1967-1968,
from Conversations with the Dead)

Boy and Shadow (c 1971, from Llanito, NM,
a community where Lyon moved in 1970)

According to Danny Lyon: “I am left feeling the people I photograph are the best people in America. I leave to the future the only thing I saw worth leaving.” (1967)
Displayed in another room were works by students.

This is not finished until it is destroyed

Tomorrow we will head to Gaithersburg, MD.
Next: Fitzgerald Gravesite.