Alice Spencer has been an important member of the Portland, Maine, arts community for 30 years. In addition to being a fine painter and printmaker, she is a co-founder of the Peregrine Press printmaking collaborative, a former member of the Maine College of Art board of directors, and chair of the City of Portland Public […]
portland
Travel
Skiing Maine: 17 Mountains
The invitation was irresistible: join Ski Maine executive director Greg Sweetser as part of a team of eight with the goal of hitting all of the Pine Tree State’s 17 ski mountains in a single long weekend last January. I agreed as soon as I was asked. We’d travel more than 1,000 miles, with time […]
Faculty art shows at colleges and universities all over the universe tend to be wonderfully democratic yet wildly incoherent free-for-alls lacking any cohesive idea or theme. For that very reason, I stopped reviewing them decades ago. It’s just not possible to say anything meaningful about a show of random works by a bunch of artists […]
Design
Glasses for Giftgiving
1.Offer your favorite vintage dressed in this mod wine bag ($22), made of recycled fabric, from Aster + Sage of Providence, RI. 401-781-0035; asterandsage.com 2. Cocktails rock and martinis look marvelous in cool “Satin Frost” glassware ($32/set of four rocks glasses; $35/set of two martini glasses), from Angela Adams of Portland, ME. 800-255-9454; angelaadams.com Get […]
2008 Nutcracker Performances Don’t miss it! Scroll through these state-by-state listings of local performances of the beloved ballet, The Nutcracker. View Yankee‘s backstage photos of Boston Nutcracker ballet dancers and read Annie Graves’ memories of “One Enchanted Evening” atThe Nutcracker.Get Our FREE Yankee Best New England Vacations Guide! Email(Required) Subscribe CONNECTICUT Nutcracker Performances Brass City […]
Yankee
Fantasy and Fetish on Campus
There is a strain of contemporary art that has to do with investigations of the artistic imagination as applied to social history and natural history. Perhaps the best known example of the former is Matthew Barney, who creates his own hallucinatory world out of bits and pieces of social fabric. The best known of the […]
Yankee
Photographs by the Book
Just in time for back-to-school, the Portland Museum of Art is hosting “Andr
1. This posh 16×16-inch Morris pillow ($140) features a wool-felt stripe motif appliqued on organic cotton flannel (cheery Pod pillow, $164). Made by Balanced Design of Providence, Rhode Island. 401-486-3589; balanced-design.com 2. Stimulating and playful, this Color Blox hand-hooked wool-felt rug (seven sizes, $80-$1,925) pops against a neutral color palette. Made by Dash & Albert […]
Yankee
Tank Farm as Work of Art
Jean Maginnis, founder and executive director of the non-profit Maine Center for Creativity, was out bicycling in South Portland, Maine, a few years ago when it occurred to her that the large oil storage tanks along the South Portland waterfront would make great canvases for an artist. In 2005, she first floated the idea that […]
When we first corresponded with the owner, we weren’t sure whether to visit this property. The owner is well-known artist and sculptor Kendra Ferguson, whose work is in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Harvard’s Fogg Museum, and others. When she told […]
Magazine
Making the Final Choice on Katahdin
In the frozen grips of a fierce storm on Mt. Katahdin, each man’s choice was his own. On Thursday evening, January 31, 1974, a fierce winter storm cut a swath of destruction across northern New England. It tore roofs off of mobile homes and tossed them into nearby trees, and sent tree limbs crashing into […]
Maine
Apocalypse Maine
Biennial art exhibitions, whether by invitation only or juried shows open to all, have become waypoints on the contemporary art landscape, providing artists and audiences alike a chance every couple of years to see what’s new, what’s happening, who’s hot, who’s arrived. As big, brawling, messy, and imperfect as they are, biennials are welcome events, […]