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Castle Hill

    EARTH BENDERS

    ‘You Can Make Anything You Want With Clay’

    Ceramic artist Isabel Souza comes full circle in the studio at Castle Hill

    By

    TRURO — Teaching a pottery class to young artists at Castle Hill took Isabel Souza “full circle,” she says. “I was eight or nine when I got the scholarship to take a class at Castle Hill through the Truro school.”

    Isabel Souza holding bone dry clay creations made by the children in a fall workshop at Castle Hill. The pieces at this stage are dry to the touch and solid but still fragile, ready for a first round of bisque firing. (Photos by Agata Storer)

    Souza knows a teacher’s influence can be life-changing. “My high school teacher could tell that I was very serious about pottery, and she encouraged me to apply to art school, which I did,” she says. After earning a B.F.A. at Syracuse University, she moved back to Truro, where she grew up, and has been working as a ceramic artist since then.

    Sofi Blandford shows off her chicken creation in still-malleable clay.
    Malina Storer working on her elephant mug.

    It’s a calling that’s in her blood, she says. “I discovered that my great-great-grandfather operated a ceramic rooftop factory in Portugal,” she says. She plans to open a shop on Wellfleet’s Main Street in the spring.

    Isabel Souza talks with the artists about the fine points of applying glaze to their pieces.

    The photos here were taken during a class that wrapped up on Nov. 16. It was one of an ongoing series for children in grades 3 to 5 by the Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill through Dec. 21. The classes are part of Castle Hill’s “Grow” program, says Laura Chause, the coordinator, which stands for “gratitude, respect, optimism, and wonder.” The classes are designed to allow students to explore and create projects that incorporate both science and art.

    Emerson Kane glazes his mug after the bisque firing.

    Other teachers include Michael Giaquinto, who is teaching collage and mixed media; fiber artist Heidi Filmer-Gallagher is teaching felting; Mary Abt explores music’s tones and frequencies; and with Kim Possee students will make candles. Thanks to funding from the state, Chause says, classes cost only $10.

    Pottery pieces awaiting firing.

    For Souza, teaching children is a new adventure. “I love how they take risks and they don’t feel badly if their projects don’t work out perfectly,” she says.

    The mood is relaxed but focused in the pottery studio at Castle Hill.

    Working with clay, “I feel like an earth bender,” says Sofi Blandford, one of Souza’s pottery students, who lives in Wellfleet. “It’s like a superpower: You can make anything you want with clay. It can be big, it can be tiny, as long as it doesn’t explode in the kiln.”

    Finished pottery after the second or glaze firing.

    ART AND ACCESS

    Castle Hill and Morgan State Join Forces for Equity

    A new residency in Truro is designed to extend professional opportunities to young Black artists

    By

    TRURO — Andre Davis, 23, graduated this month from Morgan State, a historically Black university in Baltimore. His first steps out of college have brought him to Truro, where he and recent graduate Kendra Tyler are fellows in a residency program created by a partnership between the Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill and the university.

    The residency, which happened for the first time last December, enables two recent graduates to live and work at Castle Hill for two weeks. Fellows are provided with housing, studio space, a $500 stipend, transportation, and mentorship. The program’s creators hope to accommodate participants in both the fall and spring.

    Ennis, a painting by 2021 Osborne Fellow Jasmine Adams. (Photo courtesy the artist)

    “It’s a good stepping stone to professional life,” says E.L. Briscoe, a lecturer in visual arts at Morgan State. On a windy morning with the season’s first snow dusting the grounds of Castle Hill’s Edgewood Farm, he sat at a large wooden table with Davis and Tyler, who had arrived two days earlier, discussing the residency and their plans for the upcoming two weeks.

    “I’m working on an installation,” says Tyler, 24, who graduated last May and teaches art at an elementary school in Baltimore. She’s currently working with Styrofoam and clay and planned to forage for moss, leaves, and sticks in the woods around the property. “It’s a continuation of previous work,” says Tyler. “I like to bring in natural elements to an inside space.”

    Kendra Tyler, a current Osborne Fellow at Castle Hill. (Photo by Agata Storer)

    Davis, her studio mate for the residency, typically works in illustration and painting. “Drawing is the first thing I remember really enjoying,” says Davis. “I figured, why not go to school for this and build upon it?

    “Usually, I draw from past experiences,” he continues. “It could just be everyday things like walking to the corner store, meeting up with friends, cookouts, funerals — a whole spectrum of the human experience but through the lens of somebody that grew up Black in Baltimore. Back home, my process is a ritual. I can’t really do that here. There’s no corner store in the middle of the woods. It’s real quiet here. You have more time to think about what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. It forces you to dig deep.”

    The opportunity for Davis and Tyler to come to Castle Hill was the result of a $100,000 donation from Nancy and Al Osborne. “I wanted to do a major gift to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Castle Hill,” says Nancy Osborne. “At the same time, the Black Lives Matter movement was happening in response to the murder of George Floyd.” She participated in a brainstorming session to identify ways that Castle Hill could make changes to address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion. “What struck me,” says Osborne, “was one common point: if we wanted to attract a more diverse audience and students of color, we had to finance scholarships and residencies.”

    Andre Davis (left) and Kendra Tyler, current Osborne Fellows at Castle Hill. (Photo by Agata Storer)

    Castle Hill workshops typically cost around $500 for a one-week course, not including housing. The residency program at Edgewood Farm, which hosts three or four artists in the fall and spring, costs $850 for two weeks or $1500 for one month, including housing and studio space. Another program called the Yellow Chair Salon, led and developed by Michael David, costs $725 for an eight-session online program and $3,500 for a two-week in-person master class, including housing and studio space.

    “It’s hard to get out here. It’s expensive,” says Castle Hill Executive Artistic Director Cherie Mittenthal. “We try to take out barriers to allow more people opportunities.” So far, initiatives have included the awarding of full or partial scholarships to 28 participants last summer — just 2 percent of the 1,400 students who enrolled. Other initiatives to expand access include 20 scholarships for local students, an after-school program at Truro Central School, and fully funded off-season classes for local residents over 65, which serves between 40 to 80 people each year.

    Morgan State University Lecturer E.L. Briscoe is a mentor to the current Osborne Fellows. (Photo by Agata Storer)

    Despite these initiatives, Osborne and others saw a continued need for Castle Hill to grow. Would the next 50 years bring about a more inclusive institution — or one that would grow ossified, a sort of gated community for those who could afford it?

    Osborne, who lives part-time in Truro, became involved with Castle Hill during a professional rebirth. “I became interested in pursuing art after a business career, which included working as an executive at Walt Disney for 16 years,” she says. She now creates abstract bronze sculptures exploring gestural movement. “I started taking classes at Castle Hill in 2009,” says Osborne, “and I immediately fell in love with the place.”

    After the brainstorming session in 2020, Osborne considered what she could do. “I was sitting on my couch and thought, ‘It’s time for me to step up to the plate,’ ” she says. “So, I proposed an idea to my husband: a Castle Hill artist residency in collaboration with historically Black colleges and universities, for which we would donate the initial seed money.” Her husband, Al, an economist and senior associate dean at U.C.L.A.’s Anderson School of Management, agreed.

    Morgan State’s E.L. Briscoe (left) with current Osborne Fellows Kendra Tyler (center) and Andre Davis (right) at Castle Hill’s Edgewood Farm campus. (Photo by Agata Storer)

    Castle Hill had an existing relationship with Jamal Thorne, a graduate of Morgan State and associate teaching professor of art at Northeastern University, who helped to arrange a connection with his alma mater through his former teacher E.L. Briscoe. Last year, Thorne served as a mentor for the fellows. (Myra Kooy will fill that role this year.) Briscoe hopes that former fellows will return as mentors in the future.

    Osborne sees a dual purpose for the residency. On one hand, it benefits Castle Hill: “The more diverse an organization is, the stronger it is,” she says. “Diversity keeps things growing.”

    Osborne was further motivated to do something to enrich the creative lives of young African American artists. Distraught over the murder of George Floyd and the continued racism in America, Osborne, whose husband is Black, wanted to make a difference. “My husband and I have the power of making major gifts,” she says. “If I can contribute to causes that assist in lifting up African Americans in this country, I want to be doing that.”

    She was also curious: “What happens when you bring a diverse group of artists with completely different life experiences to the Cape? How will this environment influence their creativity?”

    Jasmine Adams participated in the first residency last year. “Coming from an inner city, it was a stark change to go from a lot of noise to silence,” says Adams. Like Davis, Adams often creates images of people from her community in Baltimore. At Castle Hill, she immortalized one of her subjects in her largest painting yet.

    “I was there to challenge myself and think outside of the box,” she says. “I spent copious amounts of time in the studio. Some days I was there for 12 hours.” She created a large-scale portrait of a seated young man holding a bouquet of flowers, painted in a tight, realistic manner with unexpected details like a white outline and one eye depicted as if it’s a collaged element. A straightforward image was transformed into something off-kilter and slightly unsettling.

    “It’s not often that people have the privilege to go on a residency right after graduating,” says Adams. “Finding our way is very difficult. This was my first experience where I was being looked at as a professional artist.”

    Thinking of the future, Osborne considers the effect the Cape had on several notable abstract expressionist artists in the 1950s. “The influence of time spent on the Cape was an important part of their careers,” she says. “That same thing can happen with these artists. We just need to get more of them coming.”

    Fresh Talent

    The event: Castle Hill’s Osborne Fellows Open Studios
    The time: Thursday, Dec. 22, 4 to 6 p.m.
    The place: Truro Center for the Arts, Edgewood Farm, 3 Edgewood Way
    The cost: Free

    ARTISTS ON ART

    Celebrating Five Decades of Castle Hill

    Artists reflect on their work and the Castle Hill experience

    By

    This fall, the 50th anniversary of the Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill has been marked by several group shows celebrating the vast network of artists associated with the center. The current show at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum is the most comprehensive, featuring more than 100 artists.

    Presented in salon style, the exhibition includes artworks created in each decade of Castle Hill’s existence. There is no stylistic consistency in the show; the diversity and heterogeneity of the artwork reflects the free-wheeling spirit of the center. Several works in the exhibition were created this year, which speaks to the continued influence of Castle Hill on the creative community of the Outer Cape.

    On these pages, five artists who made pieces in 2022 reflect on their work and their connection to Castle Hill.

    Vicky Tomayko, In Memory of Yoyo. (Photo courtesy the artist)

    On her work:
    “Margaret Murphy, the former director of the Fine Arts Work Center, and her partner, Lauren Ewing, had a rabbit, Yoyo, that was very much a member of the family. They were so smitten with the rabbit. It lived in their house and would come to meetings. It passed away last year, so this is sort of a tribute to Yoyo. I’m not really known as a woodcut artist, but I love to make black-and-white woodcuts every now and then. My big influence with woodcuts is the Japanese artist Munakata. The thing I found so unusual and wonderful in his work is that there’s this transition where he completely flips the contrast. I love that about his work.”

    On Castle Hill:
    “The thing I love about Castle Hill is that it’s so community based — there is something for everyone. I am almost always amazed by teaching in the senior program, which is free for senior citizens on the Cape. There are people who are just beginning to make art but also some practicing artists. It was so pleasurable to get to know them as people, not just as students. When I’m doing a demonstration, I’m not thinking about making art. I’m just thinking about the medium and exploring the things monoprints can do. I do things I would never do in my studio. It’s freeing, and I often start things I develop into a body of work.”

    Ellen Anthony, Reaching. (Photo by Abraham Storer)

    On her work:
    “I’m fairly new to painting. I’ve been exploring my relationship to rectangles. This painting began as a redo of something. It became a torso, but I wanted to extend it and give it a head and then an arm. When I look at it now, it looks like a gender blur. The head looks male, the body looks female — although the genital area is mostly abstract. That’s a current inquiry in America. That’s of interest to me.”

    On Castle Hill:
    “I began participating in the Yellow Chair Salon [a discussion-based workshop with artist Michael David]. It pushed me to enter my artwork by putting more of my own emotional presence into my work. It’s a helpful trick to remind myself to not make art. I hope to tap into some place that is beyond derivative. I’m after pre-verbal, pre-visual, pre-me. I want to trick myself into not thinking. Yellow Chair has helped invite me into parts of myself that I didn’t have access to before. It teaches me where I need to shut down.”

    Ellyn Weiss, Hands Off (Pink). (Photo courtesy the artist)

    On her work:
    “In November, I came home from a women’s march in D.C. just after the Supreme Court ruling that allowed Texas’s ban on abortion. I used to come back from those marches feeling kind of empowered and uplifted. This time, I came back feeling not at all clear. I went back to my studio the next day, threw some raw canvas on the floor, and started making this work. I felt like slinging stuff around and making paintings that reflected what I was deeply feeling.”

    On Castle Hill:
    “I live in Truro half the year, about half a mile up the road from Castle Hill. I have been on the board for eight years, and I was chair of the board for the last four years during the anniversary, which was a big deal for us. I just handed that off.”

    John Koch, Backyard Party. (Photo courtesy the artist)

    On his work:
    “I owe a huge debt to the view outside my studio. The strata of marks in this painting tells me something about the hillside, and the dynamic of things growing out there. A lot of it is also intuitive. I like the colors; they please me. I play with them. I use combs and toothbrushes and serrated scrapers to make marks. I’m in a place of pleasure and invention, and stuff just happens.”

    On Castle Hill:
    “Castle Hill in a way is my art school. It has this unpretentious atmosphere where people who are beginners or serious all work together very comfortably and bring very different experiences to their work. This very supportive and fairly loose atmosphere has been a gift to someone like me who started with some enthusiasm but no particular ambitions.”

    Lois Hirshberg, Meditation at Canyonlands #2. (Photo courtesy the artist)

    On her work:
    “This is part of a new series since a wonderful visit to national parks in southern Utah. My spouse and I walked to this arch in Canyonlands. It took our breath away. We sat there and meditated and did tai chi. When I came home, I started these sculptures. This piece has a sneaky little arch or circle through it on the left side. It has a multicolor copper raku glaze. You never know what it’s going to come out like. It could be all blue or all copper or somewhere in between. It came out perfectly — how I wanted it.”

    On Castle Hill:
    “Castle Hill is a magnificent arts center. I call it my summer camp. I teach a class called ‘Alternative Firings,’ usually once a year. I’m still taking classes because I always want to learn more, and everyone has something to teach. Once I took a class on saggar firing, where we fired ceramics in a container filled with organic material, like salt or coffee grinds. The fuming inside the saggar creates these incredible colors. When I opened my container, I was shocked by the colors. I wasn’t sure if I liked it. I sat with these pieces and got to really love everything about them. I learned to expect the unexpected. I love that. I never know what’s going to come out.”

    A Half Century in Truro

    The event: A wide-ranging group show featuring five decades’ worth of art
    The time: Through Nov. 13
    The place: Provincetown Art Association and Museum, 460 Commercial St.
    The cost: General admission: $15

    WRITERS

    The Tarnished Legacy of the Sacklers

    Patrick Radden Keefe takes on a dynastic family

    By

    “I like a well-turned story,” says Patrick Radden Keefe. “I try to write stories that are engaging, the kinds of stories that you might not have an interest in at first — like the opioid crisis, or the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Hopefully, there’s an undertow that pulls you in, a strong narrative spine. If it feels like you’re reading a novel, then I’m doing it right.”

    Keefe achieves this in Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty. The book is about the Sacklers — the same family whose name bedecks the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harvard University, and, until recently, the Louvre — and their role in the opioid epidemic. The Sacklers own Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin. As reported in the Independent, this epidemic has struck with special vengeance on the Outer Cape.

    Author Patrick Radden Keefe. (Photo Ilene Squires)

    Keefe is a staff writer at the New Yorker, which published “The Family That Built an Empire of Pain” in 2017, the article that formed the basis for this book. But he is also the creator of Wind of Change, a podcast about a song by the Scorpions possibly written by the CIA, and the author of Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland. On Wednesday, May 19 at 6 p.m., he will discuss Empire of Pain with host Karen Dukess as part of Castle Hill Author Talks.

    Keefe humanizes and gets into the minds of the Sacklers. He treats them as more than “mustache-twirling villains,” aiming to understand “how can these people, over decades, make decisions that have disastrous consequences.” This is all the more impressive considering that no one from the Sackler family was willing to speak with Keefe — “In fact, they’ve been threatening to sue me the past couple of years,” he says. Even though the book reads like fiction, all of Keefe’s sources — interviews, court documents, emails, memos, confidential materials — are meticulously cited in the endnotes.

    Empire of Pain details three generations of Sacklers; the book even has a handy family tree for reference. The first — brothers Arthur, Mortimer, and Raymond — purchased Purdue Frederick, which would later become Purdue Pharma. Arthur, the oldest, struck it rich marketing Valium. Later, Raymond’s son, Richard, marketed OxyContin using the same template — downplaying its addictiveness and aggressively promoting it to doctors. The youngest Sacklers remain ambivalent or in denial about the source of their wealth. The family still denies any responsibility for the hundreds of thousands of lives lost to the epidemic.

    Arthur Sackler, surrounded by his art collection. (Photo courtesy Smithsonian)

    Considering that Arthur died years before OxyContin’s heyday, it is, perhaps, surprising that Keefe devotes about one-third of the book to him. Except that Arthur is a fascinating character. The son of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, he felt the pressure to be successful. He discovered that he had a knack for selling things — pharmaceuticals included. With his newfound wealth, he collected Asian art and donated to the arts and sciences. He even finagled his way into having a private office right in the middle of the Metropolitan Museum.

    But Keefe argues that Arthur laid the corrupt groundwork for the subsequent two generations of Sacklers. He launched the Medical Tribune, a “newspaper” aimed at doctors, which advertised Arthur’s own products, and erased his name from the masthead. “Arthur Sackler basically believed there was no such thing as a conflict of interest,” says Keefe, who studied law before pursuing journalism. “There are things I wouldn’t do because I realize, as a journalist, I have a platform and responsibility, a transparency that I owe the reader.” Empire of Pain is all about power and its abuse.

    “People marshal certain arguments, and then they gloss over certain facts,” says Keefe. “Arthur’s heirs suggest that he is pure as the driven snow, and as a result it is monstrous to suggest his name stands for anything other than that.”

    From the perspective of the art world, the book raises questions. How do we reconcile the role that the Sacklers’ dirty money has played in art institutions? Does philanthropy always come from a place of guilt?

    Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty, by Patrick Radden Keefe, was published April 13 by Doubleday. (Photo courtesy Penguin Random House)

    Historically — whether it’s the Medicis, Vanderbilts, or Carnegies — art has always been funded by the super-rich. And where there is money, there is corruption. As Keefe writes, activists like the photographer Nan Goldin have tried to get institutions to divest from the Sacklers. Keefe says one argument against that could be that “money is fungible,” or that “just because it’s tainted doesn’t mean you can’t, through a kind of transubstantiation, make it into a good thing.

    “I don’t think these are easy issues,” continues Keefe. “Part of the reason that they are interesting is that they are hard. I’m conflicted about it all, to be honest with you.”

    Keefe wrote the book while Covid dominated our lives. He says one result of the pandemic is that we have a greater awareness of pharmaceutical companies, and their names, because of the vaccines. Another relevant question is patent exclusivity: “After writing this book, it’s not surprising to me that the industry is pushing back.”

    There’s an “awkwardness” in the timing, he says: “I say in the book that Pfizer bribed the head of antibiotics. I got my second Pfizer shot last week.” Despite having a healthy distrust in big pharma, “I’m totally dismayed,” he says, “by people who have the opportunity to get vaccinated and don’t get vaccinated.”

    No Pain, No Gain

    The event: Karen Dukess interviews Patrick Radden Keefe as part of Castle Hill Author Talks

    The time: Wednesday, May 19, 6 p.m.

    The place: Register for a Zoom link at castlehill.org

    The cost: Free, donations appreciated

    Isn’t It Mitch?

    By

    There will be an opening reception for painter Mitchell Johnson at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill, 10 Meetinghouse Road, on Thursday, September 10th, 4 to 6p.m. The show is on view through September 18th. Johnson’s upcoming course at Castle Hill is sold out.

    Arts Briefs and Listings

    Arts Briefs for July 16 through July 22

    By

    In-Person Classes Return to Castle Hill

    Rob DuToit pastel
    Painter Rob DuToit, who created this pastel of Provincetown Harbor, will be teaching “Zen and the Art of Paste,” live at Edgewood Farm, the week of August 10 to 14. (Photo courtesy Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill)

    Following its success with virtual classes this summer, Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill is reintroducing in-person instruction, starting in August. Classes will be held outside, either at Castle Hill’s main campus at 10 Meetinghouse Road, or at the spacious Edgewood Farm on Edgewood Way, off Route 6. They will be limited to seven students, with masks required and social distancing.

    Twelve classes will be offered, including sketchbook drawing and writing with Nick Flynn and Mark Adams, photography with Robert Johnson, “Making Pictures” with Pete Hocking, hand building with Chris Watt, pastels with Rob DuToit, and plein air landscape with Cammie Watson. Visit castlehill.org for dates and times. Classes cost between $280 and $490.

    What James Balla Sees in Provincetown

    The Plague by James Balla
    The Plague is a pencil on paper by James Balla, inspired by the Albert Camus book cover and part of his show at Albert Merola Gallery. (Photo courtesy Albert Merola Gallery)

    Artist James Balla, who has run the Albert Merola Gallery in Provincetown along with its namesake for three decades, is having a show there, “What I see when you’re not here,” from Friday, July 17, through Aug. 5 at 424 Commercial St.

    The work on view is a series of pencil drawings of things seen around Provincetown during the winter and spring, “when the crowds are gone, when people are not here, except the locals, and we have time to make note of the small things, or the personal things, or the simple reading of a book or watching of a film,” Balla writes in the announcement for the exhibit.

    The gallery is open noon to 5 p.m. on Wednesday through Sunday, and by appointment (508-487-4424).

    Virtual Reading of The Great Believers

    Rebecca Makkai
    Rebecca Makkai will give a virtual reading of her book The Great Believers on Friday. (Photo New England College)

    East End Books Ptown is hosting a virtual book reading and discussion on Friday, July 17, at 5 p.m., with Rebecca Makkai, author of The Great Believers. The novel was one of the New York Times’s top 10 picks for 2018.

    The Great Believers tells two intertwining stories. The first is about the director of a Chicago art gallery in the ’80s who loses countless friends to the AIDS epidemic. He becomes close to the younger sister of one of those friends, and the second story tells of her journey, 30 years later, to reconnect with her estranged daughter, who has joined a cult.

    To register for this free Zoom event, or order a signed copy, visit eastendbooksptown.com.

    Miss Richfield Sprinkles ‘Sunshine’ at Pilgrim House

    Miss Richfield
    Miss Richfield 1981 returns live to Provincetown. (Photo courtesy Miss Richfield 1981)

    Miss Richfield 1981 is back in Provincetown, and ready to replace your Covid blues with a full spectrum of living color. She will be performing in “Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows,” something she is calling her “outdoor parking lot show.” And indeed, it will take place outdoors at Pilgrim House, 336 Commercial St. in Provincetown, with social distancing, on Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday nights at 9 p.m. through Sept. 12.

    Miss Richfield, a Provincetown favorite, has been doing virtual editions of “Bingo Bonanza” and “Trivia Shack,” but this is her first in-person show here since last year. Ticket holders (at $35 a pop) are seated first come, first served, and early shows have been selling out, so visit pilgrimhouseptown.com in advance to ensure yourself a good spot.

    Conversations on the T by Salvatore Del Deo
    Conversations on the T (2014) is an oil on canvas by Salvatore Del Deo at Berta Walker Gallery. (Photo courtesy Berta Walker Gallery)
    Hope by Romolo Del Deo
    Hope (2017) is a bronze by Romolo Del Deo. (Photo courtesy Berta Walker Gallery)

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Del Deos at Berta Walker Gallery

    The Berta Walker Gallery at 206 Bradford St. in Provincetown is celebrating “Provincetown 400” with a season full of artists who are new to its roster. But included in the show that opens on Saturday, July 18, and runs through Aug. 8, will be two ever-talented stalwarts of the Provincetown art colony, painter Salvatore Del Deo and his son, Romolo, a sculptor. (Also in the show are works by the late Elspeth Halvorsen and by painter Laura Shabott, who will be profiled in next week’s Independent.)

    During the Covid-19 crisis, the gallery will be open by appointment only (go to bertawalkergallery.com) from noon to 4 p.m. on Wednesday through Saturday.

    Classical Musicians Step Up to the Virtual Mic

    Tiberius String Quartet
    The Tiberius String Quartet will be featured on the virtual Open Mic Classical on Sunday. (Photo courtesy Open Mic Classical)

    Open mics aren’t only for pop musicians. Open Mic Classical, which usually hosts events at First Parish Brewster Unitarian Universalist Church, has gone virtual. Classical musicians hoping to share their talent can participate in an informal Zoom concert, during which audience members can give feedback and ask questions.

    Founded by clarinetist Monika Veress Woods and sculptor Bob Marcus, Open Mic Classical meets on the third Sunday of the month. On Sunday, July 19, at 3 p.m., it will feature the Tiberius String Quartet, an internationally acclaimed quartet from Transylvania. To register, visit openmicclassical.org.

    Wellfleet Preservation Hall Launches Doc Days

    Flannery O'Connor
    Author Flannery O’Connor is the subject of the documentary Flannery, streaming online as part of the Doc Days Film Series presented by Wellfleet Preservation Hall. (Photo Georgia Humanities)

    Wellfleet Preservation Hall is presenting the first of its virtual Doc Days Film Series from Friday, July 17, through July 31. The opening title is a premiere: the documentary Flannery, about Flannery O’Connor, author of the novel Wise Blood and numerous short stories with a perversely ironic and morally complex view of midcentury Southern life. The movie was the first winner of the Library of Congress Lavine/Ken Burns Prize (for $200,000), given to independent filmmakers telling stories of American history.

    For $10, you can rent the film for 72 hours and stream it at home. Go to wellfleetpreservationhall.org for details.

    Mike Wright and Paul Kelly at Alden Gallery

    The Alden Gallery at 423 Commercial St. in Provincetown will present new work by sculptor Mike Wright and painter Paul Kelly in a two-person show opening Friday, July 17, and on view through July 30.

    Both artists have lived and worked in Provincetown for decades. Wright uses found painted wood for her modernist sculptures, and Kelly paints Provincetown landscapes from unusual (and sometimes imaginary) vantage points.

    The gallery is open noon to 5 p.m. daily during the Covid-19 crisis, and masks are required.

    Hunk by Mike Wright
    Hunk is a sculpture of found painted wood by Mike Wright. (Photo courtesy Alden Gallery)
    Paul Kelly, Captain Jack's Wharf
    Captain Jack’s Wharf #12 is an oil on canvas by Paul Kelly. (Photo courtesy Alden Gallery)

     

     

    our picks for the week of June 4 through June 10

    Indie’s Choice

    By

    Outer Cape Calendar

    Pier Pressure

    Down by the Pier
    Down by the Pier, by Paul Schulenberg, is at Addison Art Gallery. (Photo courtesy Addison Art Gallery)

    The Addison Art Gallery in Orleans will make a donation to the Eastham, Wellfleet, and Truro public libraries for every Paul Schulenburg painting sold through June 9. A selection of paintings by Schulenberg of fishermen working on the piers is on view at addisonart.com.

    Different Spokes

    “Bike M.S.: Cape Cod Getaway,” a fund-raiser for multiple sclerosis, has gone virtual this year. Ride yourself, or even join a team, but sign up now at the “Virtual Bike MS: Cape Cod Getaway 2020” Facebook page. The event takes places on Saturday, June 27, 7:30 a.m. to Sunday, June 28, 4 p.m.

    Virtual Salon

    Beginning Monday, June 8, Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill is launching a four-month virtual residency program, led by Michael David, called the Yellow Chair Salon. It is open to artists of all levels and mediums: share your art practice and make friendships. The first two months will be spent as a group workshop, and for the second two, you’ll present your work for consults with guest artists. Eight sessions, 90 minutes each, $575, at castlehill.org.

    Code of Conduct

    The “Cape Symphony Baton Hero Competition” gives amateur conductors the opportunity to show off their skills without leaving their living rooms. Film a video of yourself “conducting” your favorite symphonic recording, upload it to YouTube, and submit an entry form. Submissions are due Wednesday, June 24, at 5 p.m. If you’re awarded Most Dramatic, Funniest, Most Believable/Professional, Best Special Effects, or Best Overall, you’ll receive a $25 gift card to Cape Symphony. Visit capesymphony.org and click on “Baton Hero Competition.”

    Fair Share

    Through June 21, the New Art Dealers Alliance is organizing an online art fair with 200 participating galleries, including Gaa Gallery in Provincetown. Each week, a new batch of artworks is offered for sale. Check out the wares at thisisfair.org.

    Songbird Seminar

    Melissa Lowe, director of Mass Audubon Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary, is hosting the virtual presentation “Whip-poor-will 101,” about the bird with the onomatopoeic name whose song you may have heard on spring nights. The talk, on Friday, June 12, at 3 p.m., will cover the Whip-poor-will’s “behavior, distribution, natural history, and fascinating relationship with humans.” The cost is $22. Registration at massaudubon.org is required: click on the “Get Outdoors” menu, then “Program Catalog” and “Online Programs.”

    Sand Is Grand

    The Sand Sculpture Trail in Yarmouth is on this year! Local businesses sponsor 18 family-friendly sand sculptures created by Fitzy Snowman Sculpting. You can download a map to follow along, and there will be a photo contest. It starts in June and continues through the summer. Visit yarmouthcapecod.com for details.

    Hell’s Angel

    The Exterminating Angel
    Live-stream the Metropolitan Opera’s production of The Exterminating Angel for free on Friday. (Photo Metropolitan Opera)

    The Metropolitan Opera continues its program of free virtual performances, a new opera daily. This week, on Friday, June 5 (from 7:30 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. the following day), a 2017 performance of Thomas Adès’s The Exterminating Angel, based on the Luis Buñuel film, will stream for free. To watch: Google “Nightly Met Opera Streams” and go to that page. For The Exterminating Angel, scroll down to June 5.

     

    ARS INTERRUPTUS

    FAWC Cancels Entire Summer Program

    PAAM and Castle Hill wait to see how crisis evolves

    By

    Castle Hill, Truro
    A clay studio sits empty at Castle Hill in Truro. (Photo courtesy Cheri Mittenthal)

    PROVINCETOWN — The Fine Arts Work Center notified participants in its summer workshops by email on April 29 that the entire program had been postponed until 2021 due to the coronavirus. FAWC’s week-long workshops in creative writing and visual arts, led by renowned faculty, attract students from near and far and are an important funding source for its prestigious winter fellowships.

    “It was a monumental decision, very difficult for everyone,” Richard MacMillan, FAWC’s executive director, told the Independent. “But as more and more information became clear to us, we realized that we just couldn’t, in all confidence and fairness, keep people hanging.”

    MacMillan estimated that over half of the staff and students come from out of town, some having to plan flights from overseas.

    Though FAWC’s decision may have come first, other Outer Cape arts organizations are grappling with similar scenarios.

    Kiah Coble, curator of adult education at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum, said, “We have officially rescheduled or put online all our workshops for May and June. We’re waiting to see how things evolve, and what the C.D.C. recommendations and local bylaws are for July and August.”

    Though PAAM has not yet canceled or postponed summer classes, plans are being made for what they might look like, with smaller classes (capped at five students), social distancing, mask-wearing, and increased sanitation.

    Coble said that the health of students and staff is the top priority. “If there is a possibility that we can do classes in a capacity that feels safe, I absolutely want to do it,” she said. “I don’t want to decide to cancel the summer program, then realize there was an opportunity to run small courses.”

    The decision for PAAM is not as fraught as it was for FAWC. The majority of teaching staff are year-rounders. And PAAM, as an exhibiting museum and membership organization, is less reliant on revenue from classes.

    On the other hand, Cherie Mittenthal, executive director of Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill, estimated that 60 percent of her organization’s revenue comes from classes. When Castle Hill canceled classes through July 3, including its annual encaustic conference in Provincetown, it took a big hit, but staff has not been furloughed thanks to a Paycheck Protection Program loan.

    “We are still debating where we are going to land, but the current plan is, while taking into account the advice of the state and governor, we are not going to cancel everything for the summer,” Mittenthal said. “We are going to strongly modify our program and create specialty classes that can hopefully happen throughout July, and definitely August, as well as the fall.”

    Mittenthal said that safety measures may include decreasing class sessions to four a week, limiting their size, requiring masks and gloves, sanitation measures, and doing landscape and sculpture classes outside. After acquiring its Edgewood Farm campus in 2016, Castle Hill does not lack space. If all else fails, it may do online classes only, although these would be carefully crafted and cost less.

    But numerous unknowns remain. “Will people feel comfortable enough to come?” Mittenthal asked. “Nobody knows the answer yet.” Short-term rental availability is also a consideration. “We are taking it month to month. Obviously, we don’t want to plan and then have to cancel.”

    MacMillan’s decision to cancel was a combination of courtesy for staff and students and heeding scientific advice, he said. “We can’t police social distancing,” he said. “We are not health care people.”

    Enrollees at FAWC have been given the option of a total refund, deferring until next year, or writing off tuition payments as gifts. MacMillan said that about 15 percent have made a gift, while 60 percent have asked for a refund. FAWC, too, has not had to lay off staff, thanks to a PPP loan.

    But he didn’t downplay the gravity of the situation. “The summer program is designed to develop revenue to support the fellowship program,” he said. “Loss of this revenue jeopardizes the fellowships. It’s a domino effect.” He added that no final decisions have been made about the fellowship program.

    In the meantime, FAWC will continue to engage its artists. The 24 Pearl Street Online Writing Workshops are being revamped to include more interactive and real-time elements.

    “I felt we needed to move on and take the time to reinvent the experience so that we don’t lose people,” MacMillan said. “You can lose people by waiting, you can lose people by not being transparent, and I felt we had been waiting long enough.”

    our picks for the week of April 30 through May 6

    Indie’s Choice

    By

    Outer Cape Bulletin

    Home Plates

    Susan Kurtzman
    Jobi Pottery’s Susan Kurtzman will help you “paint a plate at home” to raise money for the Truro Historical Society. (Photo Truro Historical Society)

    The Truro Historical Society, with the help of Jobi Pottery, is hoping to auction off hand-painted plates made by local artists during its gala this summer. While plate-makers are sheltering in place, Jobi’s Susan Kurtzman has organized curbside pickups to collect plates and paints, and will host an instruction session via Zoom to explain the creative process. To reserve your plate, email Lauren Kaufman at [email protected].

     

    A Time for Healy

    A virtual concert featuring Cape-based musician-songwriter Kathleen Healy, vocalist Kim Moberg, and acoustic performers Sparrow Blue (Katy Boc and Todd Nickerson) will live-stream on Thursday, April 30, at 7 p.m. Tickets range from $20 to nothing, your choice (or donate more), at eventbrite.com. Search for “Kathleen Healy.” 

    Tale-safe

    The Brewster Ladies’ Library is offering “Facebook Live Story Time,” with youth services librarian Nori, free every Wednesday at 10:30 a.m., and “Facebook Live Crafty Corner,” also with Nori, free every Friday at 10:30 a.m. The sessions are geared for children ages two to five, but all are welcome. Link up on the library’s Facebook page.

    Streaming Stars

    The Museum of Science, Boston, is hosting a free 30-minute online event, “Science in Action: Starry Night,” on Friday, May 1, at 1 p.m., which will guide explorations of the night sky. Register for free at eventbrite.com (search for the event by title), where you’ll get an entry code for Zoom.

    This Ain’t No Disco

    The Wellfleet Recreation Dept.’s Disco Night, a free virtual dance hour with JT & Angel, goes live on Friday, May 1, from 8 to 9 p.m. Link up five minutes early at meet.google.com/fiy-upac-dcc. For young ’uns, there’s a Family Dance Party from 6 to 7 p.m. that same night (meet.google.com/hct-icbs-vpy), and for do-si-do-ers, there’s a Virtual Square Dance Hour on Saturday, May 2, from 6 to 7 p.m., at meet.google.com/avk-rekj-fnd.

    Hold the Mayo

    Every year, Cape Cod Beer hosts a “Salsa Fest” on the Friday before Cinco de Mayo, and this year is no exception, though the festivities are virtual. Order a bundle of tortilla chips, salsa, and a four-pack of Cape Cod Beer for $26 at eventbrite.com (search for “salsa fest”) and join the festivities on May 1 from noon to 6 p.m. on Cape Cod Beer’s Facebook page, clicking on “events.”

    Alley Cats

    Tin Pan Alley has posted that during the crisis, with piano bar sing-alongs canceled, they’ll be initiating free at-home sessions with their regular musicians every Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday night from 7 to 8 p.m. Go to Tin Pan Alley’s Facebook page (or co-owner Jack Kelly’s) to see who’s playing and join in. 

    Milano Art Guide
    Contortionism, by Jake Troyli, is image #0202 in the Milano Art Guide’s “Colouring Book Project,” which features drawings to download. (Photo Milano Art Guide)

    Color Your World

    Remember coloring books? During the crisis, high-art drawings (not all of them kid-friendly) have become available as a creative pursuit. Try the Cape Cod Museum of Art’s array at ccmoa.org (scroll down the “Education” menu to “Coloring Page”), or, for an astonishing collection of free, download-able images, Google the Milano Art Guide “Colouring Book Project.” Number 0202 is by Jake Troyli, a visual arts fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown. Thanks to FAWC for recommending it.

     

    Arts Briefs and Listings

    Arts Briefs for April 30 through May 6

    By

    Three Days of Virtual Love

    G. Love
    G. Love performs in Detroit in 2018. He’ll be part of the “Home Is Where the Art Is” festival live-streaming May 1 at 7 p.m. (Photo Kristen Drum)

    A three-day-long virtual arts festival, “Home Is Where the Art Is,” is a benefit for the Cape Cod Arts Relief Fund, hosted by the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod. The fund provides one-time financial assistance of up to $500 to Cape artists in need.

    “The festival evolved from seeing a lot of artists doing live-stream concerts to raise money for other sectors,” says Julie Wake, AFCC executive director. “We thought, how come they’re not doing it for themselves — for the arts?”

    So far, the fund has provided relief to 35 artists, but the foundation is hoping to raise $100,000 through the festival to help even more.

    The festival, which runs from Thursday, April 30, through Saturday, May 2, is a multimedia experience, involving visual artists, dancers, and musicians of all genres. Headliners include G. Love, Amy Jo Johnson, Will Dailey, and Tianna Esperanza.

    “We wanted to represent the different regions of the Cape as well as different mediums,” Wake says.

    G. Love (a.k.a. Garrett Dutton), front man for G. Love and Special Sauce, is a blues-rock veteran who now lives full-time in Orleans. He tells the Independent that the festival is unique because it’s “artists and musicians raising money for artists and musicians.” He himself faced a “huge loss” when all of his tours were canceled because of the Covid-19 pandemic, coming right after he released a new album, The Juice.

    “Everybody is laid off, so anybody that can help anybody along the way, and lift others up, is what the community needs right now,” G. Love says.

    Visit the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod’s Facebook page for information on when and how to tune in. G. Love is performing on Friday, May 1, at 7 p.m. He also live-streams regularly from his own Facebook page. —Saskia Maxwell Keller

    Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time
    This six-volume set of Marcel Proust’s classic work of fiction, In Search of Lost Time, is from the Folio Society.

    In Search of the Proust Reading Group? It’s Gone Virtual.

    For the past year, the Proust Reading Group has met on the second Tuesday of the month at the Wellfleet Public Library to dissect and discuss Marcel Proust’s mammoth multivolume masterwork, In Search of Lost Time (from the French, À la recherche du temps perdu). Choosing Terence Kilmartin’s translation, the group has so far covered a lot of ground: about 1,000 pages out of a total of 4,000. During the crisis, members have been meeting virtually via Google Hangouts, and they’re looking for new recruits. These new members will form a subgroup, which will read the magnum opus from the beginning.

    Why take on such a gigantic literary project now? Most people, other than essential workers, have a lot of time on their hands. And, says group leader Lew Schwartz, the novel is especially relevant today.

    “As a naïve reading,” Schwartz says, “it’s a memoir of growing up during an important period in French culture, leading up to and including World War I. But on a deeper level, it asks questions such as how do we make use of our past — not simply to recall it, but what do we do with it?”

    As a group, reading In Search of Lost Time usually takes between four and five years, Schwartz says, but it may end up being less with people holed up at home. Some of the group’s activities work well over Google Hangouts, such as examining the art and listening to the music referenced in the novel. Other activities, however, such as sampling madeleines and tisane tea, require creative solutions.

    “I’m looking into it,” Schwartz says. “The boulangerie here in Wellfleet does really good ones.”

    With madeleines or without, this reading group is a meaningful way to socialize over a shared experience. If you’re interested, email [email protected]. —Saskia Maxwell Keller

    art by Christine Niles
    Make It Spicy Today, an oil on paper by Christine Niles, is one of the works in “Alone Together in Art,” a virtual show and fund-raiser at castlehill.org. (Photo courtesy Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill)

    Castle Hill Class Goes Virtual to Raise Funds

    A class at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill taught by Laura Shabott, “Creating a Body of Work to Show Through Figurative Expression,” started out on March 11 with the promise of six three-hour sessions with a model and a gallery show to cap it off. But the epidemic’s stay-at-home directive forced a change of plans.

    Shabott switched to weekly assignments and Zoom critiques. And the promised show, “Alone Together in Art,” has now gone virtual at castlehill.org, with paintings, drawings, and collages by Andrea Chapin, Anne Webb-Johnson, Christine Niles, Janet Hymowitz, Lynn Mogell, and Mary Fox available for purchase. Fifty percent (or more) of the proceeds will help sustain Castle Hill during tough times.

     

    Encounter ‘400 Years of Eastham’ in Homegrown Art

    art by Karen Kollar
    Wampanoag Native American at Pow Wow, by Karen Kollar, is one of the works in the virtual exhibit “Picture Perfect: 400 Years of Eastham.” (Photo courtesy Eastham Painters Guild)

    “Picture Perfect: 400 Years of Eastham,” an exhibit hosted by the Eastham Painters Guild, was supposed to open at the Eastham Public Library on Friday, May 1. Due to the Covid-19 crisis and with the library now closed, the show has been moved online, with works on view (as of May 1) at easthampaintersguild.com.

    The members of the Eastham Painters Guild had been preparing for this exhibit, which was one of the events commemorating Eastham 400, during the off season. The guild is also celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2020.

    The 12 member artists participating in “Picture Perfect” are John Dillon, Ron Edson, Margaret Furness, Rebecca Gmucs, Karen Kollar, Elaine Lobay, Pat Nickerson, Meg Schmidt, Willow Shire, Jody Shyllberg, Mary Anne Tessier, and Robin Wessman. Most are Eastham residents.

    The work they have contributed highlights aspects of Eastham’s history, from the first encounter between Native Americans and Pilgrims in 1620 to the present day. Each painting is accompanied by a short description of the historical event it portrays.

     

    our picks for the week of April 23 through April 29

    Indie’s Choice

    By

    Outer Cape Bulletin

    Timeless Traviata

    Metropolitan Opera's La Traviata
    You can watch this 2012 Metropolitan Opera production of La Traviata for free online this Friday to Saturday. (Photo Metropolitan Opera)

    The Metropolitan Opera continues to stream live performances from the past for free, with a new selection each day at 7:30 p.m., such as the 2012 La Traviata that’s scheduled for Friday, April 24. To access, Google “Nightly Met Opera Streams,” follow the link, and scroll down the page to the appropriate date.

     

    Spring ‘Offerings’

    Among the virtual tours offered by Outer Cape galleries, the Schoolhouse Gallery’s is among the easiest and the most thorough — there are installation views of the Provincetown space and individual shots of each work. A new group show, “Offerings,” is up on Artsy, while “Pentimento: Bring Back to Mind” remains on view. Link to both at galleryschoolhouse.com.

    Castle Hill Online

    Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill has ramped up its virtual presence. On its Facebook page, Kate Wallace leads “Yoga: Poetry in Motion” on Sunday mornings at 9:30 a.m. and reads classics to children on “Kate’s Kids Book Time,” Thursday mornings at 9:30 a.m. The specific programs are posted a day or two before. And on Castle Hill’s website (castlehill.org) the virtual gallery has been expanded, including great displays of two new shows: a fund-raiser, “Alone Together in Art,” and an encaustic exhibit, “Pushing Boundaries.” Take a peek, make a purchase.

    Preserving the Arts

    Wellfleet Preservation Hall has been keeping its devotees busy at home. Besides “Virtual Yoga With Jen” (Tuesdays at 9 a.m.), “Free Basic Ballet Class” (Mondays at 1 p.m.), “Zoom Zumba” (Thursdays at 5:30 p.m., Tuesdays at 5, and every other Sunday at 9 a.m.), musician Monica Rizzio is doing a benefit concert for the hall, streaming live on Saturday, April 25, at 8 p.m. Link to all at wellfleetpreservationhall.org.

    Most Happy Béla

    Irrepressible musicians all over are performing online, but Payomet fave Béla Fleck’s “Banjo House Lockdown,” with his wife, Abigail Washburn, accompanying him (they’re often in their pj’s), live-streams Fridays at 7 p.m. on Fleck’s Facebook page. And here’s a great resource: Solidarity Sessions offers a wide selection of virtual concerts scheduled way in advance, many with Cape musicians, on its Facebook page.

    Hand in Hand

    Provincetown actor-songwriter-filmmaker Anne Stott has produced a remarkably soothing and eerie one-take short (just shy of two minutes long) about washing your hands to flatten the curve. It’s called “Together” and is reminiscent of French essai films of the late ’60s. Watch it for free on Stott’s YouTube page.

    Body of Work

    Life drawing at PAAM
    PAAM’s twice-weekly life drawing classes, like the one pictured here, are now on Zoom for $10 a session. (Photo PAAM)

    The life drawing classes with live models at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum are no longer just a memory of times past: Virtual life drawing classes are now available on Zoom on Tuesday and Friday mornings from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. The cost is $10 per session, and you can read the guidelines at paam.org. To register, email [email protected].

    A-F-C-C Spells Relief

    The financial security of artists and musicians is usually an afterthought in times like these, so the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod’s Arts Relief Fund is a great place to funnel your donations. Go to artsfoundation.org (under “Programs”) to give, and on the receiving end, check out the A.F.C.C. initiative Arts Cape Cod (at artscapecod.org). You’ll find an excellent selection of online treats under “Online & Streaming.”

     

    CERAMICS

    Taking Clay Sculpture to Its Expressive Limits at Castle Hill

    Two ceramics artists make the most of winter residencies

    By

    Editor’s note: As we went to press with this issue we learned that the opening of the sculpture show by the artists profiled in this article, which was scheduled for Thursday, will not take place. The Independent will continue to report on the work of artists in the community as an essential part of Outer Cape life.

    The two winter residents at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill, Juliet Ehrlich and Rachel Stevens, are ceramic sculptors, not functional potters, and their work is as distinct from traditional pottery as the two artists are from each other. Ehrlich and Stevens have been sharing a residence and working side by side seven days a week since January in a studio at Castle Hill’s main campus on Meetinghouse Road.

    Ehrlich, from Louisville, Ky., has worked and taught around the world and apprenticed with a master potter in New Zealand in her teens. The sculptural form she works in, bas-relief, projects outward from a flat surface.

    Castle Hill winter resident Juliet Ehrlich shows off a cityscape bas-relief. (Photos Susannah Elisabeth Fulcher)

    “My work is both sculpture and painting, and that’s what makes it unique,” Ehrlich says. “This developed for me slowly from being a potter. I would embellish small things, then I wanted a larger canvas, and then I was taken with color.”

    The three-dimensionality of bas-relief is part real and part filled in by the viewer. “It’s like a relationship,” Ehrlich says. “You see another human being who intrigues you; you want to know more. It’s like that for a painting or a sculpture — it begins with a moment of entry. Something grabs you, you become fascinated, and suddenly you’re moved.”

    Ehrlich has had commissions from private clients and public institutions, in clay and in bronze, to portray a wide range of subjects — from botany to portraiture, historical to cultural. “Diversity is my trademark,” she says. “Each commission is very different. The act of creation brings into being ideas.”

    Ehrlich speaks exuberantly about her art. “The medium itself, clay, is so boundless in its capacity to move, you can do almost anything with it,” she says. “The engineering and firing is a whole in-between realm. I sand, I grout, then I move into painting. And I love that! I’m fascinated by the nuance of color and the fact that light and color are both fugitive and chameleon-like in their nature.”

    Her residency at Castle Hill has been a joyful experience. “I arise and I am immediately tuned to nature and her signals, whether it is raining or windy,” she says. “Nature expressed in its destructive form, or its lilting, beautiful, spring form — they are all poems, and they ignite my senses.”

    Stevens, Ehrlich’s studio mate, works in figurative ceramic sculpture derived from her imagination and memory. During her residency, she has created some free-standing and wall-hanging pieces, as well as four totems assembled of 14 to 15 elements stacked one on top of the other.

    “Each of my pieces is an original, one of a kind,” Stevens says. “I look at my art and I think: what’s that all about? It’s a hodgepodge of everything: animals, geometric forms, people. And that’s life. We’re all tied together — the natural world, the world of humanity, the products of humanity. Then throw in the rapid change, disillusionment, the chaos of things, everything I’ve done in the past — coming together in this explosion of creativity.”

    The two totems beside Castle Hill resident Rachel Stevens arise from an “explosion of creativity,” she says.

    Stevens is an untrained artist who has worked as a slot casino cashier, a stonemason, a vegan chef, a paralegal, and a West Texas criminal defense lawyer. “About 1984, in the middle of my second marriage, I had two small children in Austin,” she says. “It was rainy, so I needed something to do with my kids. I bought some clay, and we sat down together. They lost interest after five minutes, and here I am, 35 years later, still doing it.” She laughs.

    “I’ve never had a model,” Stevens says. “When I first started, I did some portraiture from photographs. And I’ve used my own body at times in the mirror, just to see how things work. I have a pretty sound knowledge of anatomy from being a trial lawyer. I had a lot of personal injury cases, so I became very familiar with injuries and that sort of thing. And I tend to be a very good observer of faces, bodies, different shapes. People fascinate me.”

    Stevens recently published a memoir, Blowing Up Rachel: A Non-binary Trans Woman’s Dialogue With Each Other, about her experience transitioning nearly two decades ago. “I am kind of conflicted,” she says. “I’ve always been conflicted about a lot of things. My memoir is one part of me talking to the other part of me for a couple of hundred pages.”

    Stevens sees her life story and her identity as an artist as inextricable. “I have been through a lot, with marriages and children and transition, different jobs,” she says. “It has opened me up to a lot of possibility. I’ve always had this creative urge and, of course, I’ve had to reinvent myself in many ways over the years. I’m not sure what came first, the creative urge or the need to reinvent myself. I’m not sure where the creative urge comes from, or what fortifies it in people who are driven by it, such as I am. But yes, it’s made me embrace change and take risks, and that informs my art. Some people find my artwork disturbing, because it’s very expressive. It can trigger emotions in some people that they don’t like. Hopefully it won’t be too demanding.”

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