Press Release | Fitchburg Art Museum

Category: Press Release

October 29, 2024

PR: A Night at The Museum: The G.O.A.T. Gala

A Night at The Museum: The G.O.A.T. Gala

Date: Saturday, November 16, 2024
Time: 6 to 9 pm

Image: Walter Iooss, Blue Dunk, Lisle, IL, 1987, archival pigment print. Gift from Andrew King, 2020.151.26.

October 29, 2024
Fitchburg, MA—The Fitchburg Art Museum invites the public to attend The G.O.A.T. Gala on Saturday, November 16, 2024.

A Night at the Museum provides support for FAM’s community initiatives, exhibitions, and special programs. This year’s celebration is inspired by the iconic sports photography of Walter Iooss. The Fitchburg Art Museum’s G.O.A.T. Gala celebrates our FAMily and embraces team spirit. Surrounded by photographs of some of the greatest athletes of the 20th century, this lively sports-themed evening is set to be the Greatest of All Time!

To kick off this special evening, the Red Raiders Marching Band and the FHS Cheer Squad will be welcoming attendees in the outdoor FAM Courtyard from 6 to 6:30 pm greeting guests as they arrive. Guests are encouraged to wear cocktail attire in their favorite team’s colors and can pose with props in our FAM photo backdrop. Finicky Fork catering will serve a menu of playful sports-themed appetizers and specialty cocktails will be served (cash bar with each guest receiving one complimentary drink ticket). There will be a Silent Auction where guests can bid on game tickets and sports memorabilia, and a DJ will be playing music in galleries.

The Museum thanks the G.O.A.T. Sponsors: Country Bank, and Enterprise Bank; M.V.P. Sponsors: Fitchburg State University, ACHLA Designs, Cabot Wealth Management, and Peter Laytin & Paula Callanan; and Rookie of the Year Sponsors: Michael DeMarco & Livia Umpierre, and Legends Grille & Sports Bar for supporting this gala.

Tickets are $40 for Members & $50 for non-members in advance, and $50 for Members & $60 for non-members at the door.

Contact Aimee Cotnoir, FAM Membership and Events Manager with questions at acotnoir@fitchburgartmuseum.org or events@fitchburgartmuseum.org.

Image: Walter Iooss, Blue Dunk, Lisle, IL, 1987, archival pigment print. Gift from Andrew King, 2020.151.26.

About FAM
The Mission of the Fitchburg Art Museum is to inspire creativity and learning, and to contribute to the well-being of our diverse communities in Fitchburg, North Central Massachusetts, and New England.

To accomplish this mission, we organize exhibitions of the work of New England contemporary artists and artworks from our art historical collections, offer programs for learners of all ages, support public art projects, invite community participation and partnerships, and stimulate the local creative economy – all in the spirit of inclusivity.

The Fitchburg Art Museum serves the cities of Fitchburg and Leominster and the surrounding communities in North Central Massachusetts and Southern New Hampshire. Founded in 1925, FAM plays a vital role in the cultural life of the region and has recently repositioned itself to focus on community access and service. FAM uses its artistic and educational resources to aid in the economic revitalization of Fitchburg, and the Museum maintains active educational partnerships with the local school systems, as well as Fitchburg State University. FAM is an engine for creativity, education, community building, and fun!

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Media Contact
Nick Capasso, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Director
Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
ncapasso@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

September 27, 2024

PR: Bob Dilworth: When I Remembered Home

Bob Dilworth: When I Remembered Home

September 28, 2024 – January 12, 2025

Opening Reception: Saturday, September 28, 2:00 – 4:00pm

Bob Dilworth, Piggy-Back, 2023, acrylic paint, enamel paint, paper on canvas, 66 x 66 inches. Courtesy of the Artist and Cade Tompkins Projects.

Dilworth paints the people and places he loves on a monumental scale and in vivid color, and over the last eight years his style has evolved to include intricate layers of paint, paper, and fabric. The fabric and paper in many of Dilworth’s paintings originated from the homes and closets of his family and friends, and their inclusion acts as a material manifestation of memory, honoring and memorializing loved ones from his hometown of Lawrenceville, Virginia.

Not only does Dilworth portray his loved ones—family and chosen family—but he repeats their figures to capture different facets of their personalities. Portraying, Dilworth offers an intimate view of his subjects and their internal lives as well as a powerful corrective to how Black people have been historically represented in fine art and popular culture.

After decades as a painter and a professor of studio art at the University of Rhode Island, Dilworth has a profound understanding of paint and how it reacts, transforms, and moves, and that predictably has driven his interest in cloth. Fabric, and the challenges posed by learning to use a sewing machine, have become sources of deep creative inspiration for Dilworth in recent years. The works in this exhibition trace this evolution, presenting for the first time a collection of compositions made entirely of fabric.

Mark your calendars! We will celebrate the opening of Bob Dilworth: When I Remembered Home on Saturday, September 28, 2024, from 2 – 4 pm. This reception is free for FAM members or with admission.

This exhibition was organized by FAM Curator Emily Mazzola and FAM’s Terry and Eva Herndon Assistant Sarah Harper.

Bob Dilworth, Lawrenceville Landscape #2, 2021, acrylic paint, acrylic based spray paint, paper, fabric, markers on canvas, 67 x 95 inches. Courtesy of the Artist and Cade Tompkins Projects.

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Sarah Harper
Terry and Eva Herdon Assistant Curator Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
sharper@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

February 21, 2024

PR: Africa Rising: 21st Century African Photography

Africa Rising: 21st Century African Photography

February 24, 2024 – February 23, 2025

Opening Reception: Saturday, March 2, 2:00 – 4:00pm

Aïda Muluneh (Ethiopian, b. 1974), Distant Echoes of Dreams, 2018, Edition of 7, archival digital print, Sinon Collection Fund, 2020.18

A phrase coined in reference to the continent’s rapid economic growth after the turn of the century, “Africa Rising” applies equally to contemporary African fine art photography, which has exploded across the continent over the last few decades. The exhibition Africa Rising at the Fitchburg Art Museum (FAM) is not a comprehensive survey of 21^st-century African photography, but it includes work by prominent photographers working throughout the continent today.

George Osodi, Delta Black Gold, 2013, c-print, Museum Purchase with Funding by the Geneviève McMillan-Reba Stewart Foundation, 2020.19

Almost all of the work exhibited was produced in the 21^st century, and much of it was created by individuals born in the 1980s and 1990s. Some were university or art-school trained, while some learned their photographic techniques through short-term, intensive workshops. Others are self-taught, honing their skills through experience. Some started with cameras that used film, others with digital cameras or their mobile phones. Some focus on documentary images, others stage scenes. All have compelling stories to tell.

Certain themes recur: reclaiming or reasserting identity in the aftermath of colonialism, environmental exploitation and degradation, female empowerment, otherness, and Afro-futurism. Underlying these themes is a steadfast commitment to changing the pessimistic narrative about Africa presented in the Western media with its focus on war, famine, disease and corruption.

Theirs is a continuing African narrative of affirmation delivered with compassion, social concern, and even anger, but also with wit, humor, and hope. FAM celebrates African art and its creators through this sampling of current African photographers’ work, stunning in its beauty and power.

Africa Rising: 21^st Century African Photography showcases a growing number of works by African photographers in the Fitchburg Art Museum’s already distinguished photography collection. The acquisition of work by African photographers is part of an ongoing initiative to further develop both FAM’s African art and photography collections – already areas of importance at the museum. The selection is concentrated on 21^st-century work and the power of individual images.

FAM’s exhibition includes photographs ranging from the work of well-known photographers (e.g. South Africa’s Zanele Muholi, Ethiopia’s Aida Muluneh, and Morocco’s Lalla Essaydi) to up and coming individuals (e.g. Wilfred Ukpong from Nigeria, Tamara Kudita from Zimbabwe, and Maurice Mbikaye from the Democratic Republic of the Congo). About half of the photographers in the collection are women, reflecting the increasing number of women working in photography across the continent.

Africa Rising, and the expansion of FAM’s collection, have been generously supported by a major grant from the Geneviève McMillan-Reba Stewart Foundation. The exhibition was organized by FAM’s Consulting Curator for African, Oceanic, and Native American Arts, Jean Borgatti.

Phumula, Paris, 2019 ©Zanele Muholi, courtesy of the artist, Yancey Richardson, New York, and Stevenson Cape Town _ Johannesburg

Zanelle Muholi, (South African, b. 1972), Phumula, Paris, France, 2019, Edition 5/8, gelatin silver print, Museum Purchase, with Funding by the Geneviève McMillan-Reba Stewart Foundation, 2020.65

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Media Contact
Nick Capasso, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Director
Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
(978) 424-4601
ncapasso@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

February 19, 2024

PR: On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied

On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied

Through June 2, 2024

Claudia Olds Goldie, Eve’s Quandary, 2018, stoneware, graphite pencil drawing, 29″ x 16″ x 14.″ Courtesy of the artist.

On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied features seven contemporary artists who identify the body as a site of empowerment. Working in diverse media, artists Azita Moradkhani, Catherine McCarthy, Claudia Olds Goldie, Lindsey Beal, Maria Yolanda Liebana, Minoo Emami, and Nafis White experiment with representations of feminine embodiment to explore the personal and collective histories of women existing within oppressive social and political environments.

Taking inspiration from the movement for women’s rights in Iran, modern hip hop, historical gynecological tools, and Victorian hair weaving, these artists engage the feminine form as a site for personal reckoning with historical traumas and their impacts upon daily life in the present. Patriarchal political systems, cultural norms, and religious demands of femininity are called into question. Rather than simply bearing the weight of such heavy histories, these artists focus on radical joy and beauty to reassert agency over themselves and their surroundings.

Catherine McCarthy, Mother Load, 2023, acrylic and oil on canvas, 30″ x 24.” Courtesy of the artist.

Throughout this exhibition, the body often appears distorted, swathed in mesmerizing patterns, or removed from sight entirely. Disjointed limbs evoke the dehumanizing demands placed upon feminine presentation and conduct within the law, popular media, religious traditions, and family histories. Intricate fabrics and tattoos highlight the strength, beauty, and vitality of unfettered personal expression. Even when hidden from view, the body feels present, calling attention to the void where a form should be. Whether represented through stark archival photography, delicate graphite drawings, or a dazzling maximalist aesthetic, the feminine form becomes an intimate place to reclaim autonomy and confront the politicization of gender.

The artists of On Her Terms entice the world to see reality through their eyes and experiences. Every work within this exhibition constitutes an act of reclamation: the continuous practice of rejecting ascribed, restrictive formats for experiencing femininity and exploring self-fashioned approaches to personal expression and freedom.

This exhibition was organized by former FAM Curator Lauren Szumita and Terry and Eva Herndon Assistant Curator Eli Yung. On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied is supported in part by the Simonds Lecture Fund.

Maria Yolanda Liebana_The World According to April 26th, 2023_2023

Maria Yolanda Liebana, The World According to April 26, 2023, 2023, acrylic, molding paste, mixed media collage on wood panel, 60″ x 48.” Courtesy of the artist.

Programs

Gallery Talks
April 7 AND May 19, 2:00 pm
Stroll the FAM galleries with exhibiting artists as they talk about their work in On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied.

Artist Talk: Maria Yolanda Liebana
April 28, 2:00 pm
Artist Maria Yolanda Liebana is a first-generation Latina artist. She reclaims once-familiar material goods to form objects with new value and meaning, such as high- and low-end art materials. Her work is oncluded in On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied.

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Media Contact
Nick Capasso, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Director
Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
(978) 424-4601
ncapasso@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

February 15, 2024

PR: Portrayed by Eakins: Ella Crowell as Model and Student

Portrayed by Eakins: Ella Crowell as Model and Student

February 3-June 2, 2024

Thomas Eakins (US American, 1844–1916), Portrait of Ella Crowell, c. 1892, oil on canvas.
Gift of Nancy Crowell Reinbold, 2015.33.

This exhibition explores the life of Ella Crowell (1873–1897), the eldest niece of one of this country’s most celebrated and influential American artists, Thomas Eakins (1844–1916). Eakins was known for his uncompromising dedication to realism, often depicting his family, friends, and students with great psychological acuity.

Ella was an important figure in her uncle’s art and life: he famously painted her as a toddler in 1876, and she and a younger sister studied with him in the 1890s. Her mental health, however, declined during those years, and she tragically died by suicide in 1897. Ella’s parents held Eakins responsible for her early death, and the family remained forever estranged.

Portrayed by Eakins seeks to uncover the broader scope of Ella’s lived experience. Period correspondence suggests that she wished to chart an independent course, one in which she was not reliant on family or marriage for financial support or social relevance. Family photographs, archival materials, and art reproductions trace the contours of Ella’s life from her early childhood to her studies in Philadelphia. The centerpiece of the exhibition is a rarely seen, recently conserved double-sided oil sketch of Ella by Thomas Eakins, painted in the 1890s.

The oil sketch and related family materials were generously presented to the Fitchburg Art Museum in 2015, a gift of Eakins’s great-great-grandniece, Nancy Crowell Reinbold. These objects help us to understand a life lived in the shadow of one of America’s most acclaimed portraitists.

This exhibition was organized by Guest Curator Elizabeth Athens, Assistant Professor of Art and Art History at the University of Connecticut.

Programs

Art at the Intersection of Health and Well-being: A community gathering for every day healing
Saturday, March 16, 9am
Using the portrait of Ella Crowell, this program will explore art as therapy to support healing pathways and integration of traumatic experiences. Presenters will explore definitions of trauma and discuss the arts as a healing method. Following the presentations, group meetings will share in community arts engagement, discussion, and resources.

Curator and Conservator Talk
Sunday, March 24, 2pm
Guest Curator Elizabeth Athens and painting conservator Birgit Straehle draw on family history, archival discoveries, and material evidence to provide greater context for understanding Thomas Eakins’s portrait of Ella Crowell.

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Media Contact
Nick Capasso, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Director
Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
(978) 424-4601
ncapasso@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

February 13, 2024

PR: Ria Brodell: Butch Heroes

Ria Brodell: Butch Heroes

Through July 14, 2024

Ria Brodell, Esther Eng aka Brother Ha 1914-1970 United States, 2022, gouache on paper. Courtesy of the artist.

Ria Brodell’s ongoing Butch Heroes series recovers and celebrates previously lost moments in LGBTQIA history. Over the past thirteen years, Brodell has searched Boston’s archives for newspaper articles, journal entries, and court records that document people whose lives show evidence of gender nonconforming experience before the twentieth century. Their names and narratives serve as the basis for portraits inspired by Catholic iconography. These paintings (and the biographical notes that accompany them) memorialize the heroism of people who pursued life and love on their own terms.

Ria Brodell, Tom c. 1940 Stó:lō, 2022, gouache on paper. Courtesy of the artist.

Ria Brodell, Johnny Williams c. 1956 South Africa, 2022, gouache on paper. Courtesy of the artist.

Though many of the people Brodell discovered received public attention for their perceived “oddity” or violation of laws concerning gender performance, Brodell shifts the narrative away from unmitigated rejection or punishment. Instead, they balance their interpretation to share the creative, joyful ways Queer individuals throughout history have carved out lives for themselves within social structures designed to discourage or criminalize their identities. Drawing upon descriptive accounts and primary sources, Brodell creates real or imagined portraits of their subjects in the style of Catholic holy cards: handheld, devotional images of saints offering guidance that are commonly shared among friends and family. This aesthetic not only references the artist’s own upbringing in the Church, but it serves as a subversive act that venerates people who were abused by religious institutions during their lifetimes.

Ria Brodell is a non-binary trans artist, educator and author based in Boston. Brodell attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and received a BFA from Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle and an MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University. Brodell has had solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States, is a recipient of an Artadia Award, a Massachusetts Cultural Council Artist Fellowship and an SMFA Traveling Fellowship. Brodell’s work has appeared in the Guardian, ARTNews, The Boston Globe, New American Paintings, and Art New England, among other publications. Brodell’s book, Butch Heroes, was released in 2018 via MIT Press.

Ria Brodell: Butch Heroes was organized by FAM’s Terry and Eva Herndon Assistant Curator Brooke “Eli” Yung.

Hours:
Wednesdays through Fridays, noon – 4:00pm
Saturdays and Sundays, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Website: www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

Media Contact
Nick Capasso, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
Director
Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street
Fitchburg, MA 01420
(978) 424-4601
ncapasso@fitchburgartmuseum.org
www.fitchburgartmuseum.org

HOURS

Wednesdays through Fridays: 12–4pm
Saturdays and Sundays: 11am–5pm
First Thursday of each month: 12–7pm

CONTACT

Fitchburg Art Museum
185 Elm Street,
Fitchburg, MA 01420
Phone 978.345.4207 info@fitchburgartmuseum.org

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Support FAM

PR: A Night at The Museum: The G.O.A.T. Gala

PR: Bob Dilworth: When I Remembered Home

PR: Africa Rising: 21st Century African Photography

PR: On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied

On Her Terms: Feminine Power Embodied

Through June 2, 2024

Programs

PR: Portrayed by Eakins: Ella Crowell as Model and Student

Portrayed by Eakins: Ella Crowell as Model and Student

February 3-June 2, 2024

Programs

PR: Ria Brodell: Butch Heroes

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