artscope magazine: January/Febraury 2009 Welcome Statement: Brian Goslow, managing editor Letters to the Editor To the Ends of the Earth, Painting the Polar Landscape DON MAYNARD: MAINTAINING GRAVITY RYAN MCLENNAN: LOTTERY FAITH RINGGOLD: Story Quilts SCOTT SCHULDT: The Politics of Beads OUR CUPS RUNNETH OVER: Sculptural and Functional Ceramic Cups NOW & THEN ANNUAL MEMBER'S JURIED EXIBITION In Pursuit of Beauty LAURA EVANS: TURN.EXTEND.ADJUST.BEND.REST.REPEAT 20 ARTISTS OF WORCESTER ... AND THEIR WORK SPACES CANVAS FINE ARTS GALLERY ERIC CARLE MUSEUM OF PICTURE BOOK ART PHOTOGRAPHIC FIGURES TO ROME, TO ROAM NEW PAINTINGS BY TOM GLOVER NEW SCULPTURE BY MEGAN BOGONOVICH NETWORKS 2008: A COLLABORATION LYNNE DREXLER - PAINTER ALISTAIR MCCALLUM: PHOTOGRAPHS OF THE NATURAL AND PASTROAL WORLD NICHOLAS ABRAHAM A DAMNED FINE IDEA: BERLOIZ'S LA DAMNATION DE FAUST IN THE MET: LIVE IN HD CIRQUE LE MASQUE PEER GYNT REAL ART WAR STEVE SYVERSON AND THE ARTS LEAGUE OF LOWELL Capsule Previews: January/February 2009

FAITH RINGGOLD: Story Quilts James Fortiano Through March 1 META WARRICK FULLER: Sculpture from the Studio Through May 17 Danforth Museum of Art. 123 Union Avenue. Framingham, Massachusetts AFTER A SMOOTH TRIP ON THE COMMUTER RAIL FROM BOSTON'S SOUTH STATION TO FRAMINGHAM, I FOUND MYSELF, AFTER A 10-MINUTES WALK, IN THE STIMULATING COMPANY OF FAITH RINGGOLD AND HER FRIENDS. MS. RINGGOLD, WHO HAS A LONG HISTORY OF ACHIEVEMENT IN THE PRIVATE AND PUBLIC SPHERE OF ART, DOESN'T TRAVEL ALONE. AND THE DANFORTH MUSEUM HAS DONE A STELLAR JOB, BEHIND ITS UNPREPOSSESSING FAçADE, OF HOSTING A BUSTLING CROWD OF THE TALENTS FAITH BRINGS WITH HER -- IN PARTICULAR, META WARRICK FULLER, WHO SITS, IN HALF PROFILE, ONE TALENT AWAY FROM FAITH RINGGOLD, IN THE STORY QUILT " LE CAFé DE ARTISTSES." Fuller, one of our foremost African-American sculptors, chose the Danforth as much as the Danforth chose her. She had lived and worked for years in Framingham, and her descendents recently gifted the museum with a large collection of the sculptures and sculpting tools from her studio. She studied with Rodin in Paris at the turn of the last century and Fuller carries forward her teacher’s strength and tenderness in such bravura works as the group sculpture “Danse Macabre” and in the deeply felt portrait bust “Woman Glancing to Her Right.” There is an intimately observed quality to the art in this studio-cumgallery which creates a hush in which one can almost hear the scrape of Ms. Warrick’s chisel and the tap of her mallet, both silent now, on her original work table. Back in the main gallery, one gathers the sense that Faith Ringgold hasn’t missed many connections in her life and her art. She has a symphonic sensibility, embracing both the spirited dead and the very alive. “Le Caf é des Artistes,” for example, is at the same time a rambling but cohesive crowd of luminaries seated at outdoor tables in front of a heterogeneous background of blue sky, a looming cathedral, and the gaily-striped awnings of the eponymous café. One would think that their personalities would be lost in the crowd or crowded out by their busy background. Not at all. Instead, each distinct artistic sensibility peers out from the crowd through alchemy of posture and dress and an intangibly individual expression in the eyes and Read the entire article in our magazine pages...