New works by Johnny Adimando in the renewed Eddy Street window and fiber art by Michelle Leavitt  will be installed in these two windows by December 2. Illustrator Mary Jane Begin fills the University of RI Library window as part of a larger exhibition inside the URI Gallery related to  ART AND HEALING:REMEMBERING CHRISTIANE CORBAT–THE WORK CONTINUES. Please print the map, see more information about the artists below, and enjoy the walk. Other windows will be changing later in winter.

Two Brothers Beauty Supply, Eddy Street

Johnny Adimando returns with new works on paper. More information coming soon. The installation will be installed by December 2, 2014. Above is the work in progress.


Night Carriers I (The Red Circadian)
2015
Mixed media on paper and mylar 
50" x 79"


About the Work
I learned the camouflaging properties of beauty, the navigation of intricately organized spaces, and the virtues of cleanliness and order at an early age.  At this time, I was also made to understand the existence of the omnipresent “other.” As such, the images in my work are decidedly labyrinthine, implying a constantly shifting-scale, referencing the shuttle cockpit, religious conclave, and burial chamber. The visual dynamic is one of complex symmetry, coordinated patterns, and elaborate constructions that form symbiosis with spectral visions and occult symbology.

I believe the world; as we know it, is a panopticon, and the “divine” is an ever-present watchman. Through my work, I explore the good-intentioned processes of self-imprisonment by way of dogma, fear, and morality. I am interested in this notion of the pursuit of perfection while under surveillance, and I continue to explore the confounding notion that servitude to any outside source can truly function in an ever-expanding universe. 

About the Artist
Johnny currently lives and works in Providence, RI.

Johnny Adimando is currently part-time faculty in the departments of Painting and Printmaking at the Rhode Island School of Design. He has also served on the Printmaking faculty at the Montserrat College of Art and Bucknell University.  Adimando earned his BFA (’05) from the Tyler School of Art at Temple University and MFA (’09) from the Rhode Island School of Design.  He is the recipient of several major awards including a two-year fellowship and artist residency at Bucknell University (’05-’07), the Temple Rome Grant, a Frogman’s Print and Paper Workshop scholarship, and most recently, a Faculty Professional Development Grant from RISD.

His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and is held by public and private collections including ; Philadelphia Free Library, Samek Art Gallery at Bucknell University, and Tower Investments Gallery in Philadelphia, PA.  His work also appears in a multitude of national print exchange projects and flat file programs.  He is currently represented by Diane Birdsall Gallery in Old Lyme, CT and Yellow Peril Gallery in Providence, RI.

Adimando’s practice is defined by a focus on intense detail, technical proficiency, and the harmonious mixture of various mediums.  His work does not subscribe to one particular convention; bridging dedicated engagement with various print media processes into photography, sculpture, and video.  It has been described as “art that speaks to a constantly shifting and material reality.”

For more on Johnny Adimano’s work, please go to johnnyadimando.com

RI Housing

Michele Leavitt textiles

Installing in the window December 2. More information coming soon.


Michele Leavitt

Soft Shoes
reverse applique quilt with t-shirts
60” x 44” 


About the Work
Cotton knit material behaves in interesting ways.  Here, several tee shirts are cut to create two squares, the colors are shuffled and layered.  The shoes - which are mine, my boys,' and their friends shoes - are 'drawn' on via machine stitching and then cut to reveal the images in color.


About the Artist 
Problem solving is at the core of my practice, as ideas arise, I explore my media for the best ways to express these. The whole work becomes a challenge both in technical and pictorial terms. My work evolves from the available materials, the technical challenges, and my love of experimentation. Materials include paint and canvas, paper and pencil, watercolor, and especially collage and textiles. I did study art academically while I never had sewing lessons, instead I’ve made up techniques according to pictorial needs. The works express my personal reflections on living here now.

On her fiber art:
“Exploring these art forms for adaptation to new uses or another style intrigues me.  For instance, there are several textiles in this category I fondly call frazzlin' appliques.  My mom used the word frazzlin' to indicate a small frayed snippet of fabric.  Here, frazzling scrapes of fabric - saved over decades as too interesting to toss out - are combined to describe familiar landscapes.  Quilting, my original form of creative play, adapts to both pictorial and abstract applications.

The word frazzle is distantly related to the word fringe.  The fringe is the end of the carpet or other textile where the fibers come apart into individual strands. This leads to the next group of works,  hand knotted carpets.”

For more on Michele’s work, please go to michelleavitt.com

URI Providence Campus Library

ART AND HEALING:REMEMBERING CHRISTIANE CORBAT–

THE WORK CONTINUES November 3- December 12th.

Art and Healing Round Table November 13^th  in the Paff Auditorium

Gallery Reception November 20^th from with Performances by:

Tenderloin Opera, along with music, dance, inspired words, a group of Prayer Shawl knitters, and interactive expressive arts activities.

A multimedia exhibit of healing artists – fine artists, art therapists and rehabilitative artists, expressive artists - representing the use of art in healing, inspiring, transforming and overcoming illnesses.

The exhibit features the work of: the late Christiane Corbat, Mary Jane Began, and Cynthia Packard with Mary Ellen Benoit, Diana Boehnert, Mary Jane Condon Bohlen, Carol Conley, the late Sr. Corita Kent, Bill Comeau, Pam Cruze, Barbara Cunha, Cynthia F. Davidson, Sandy DeLuca, Tamara Diaz Ted DiLucia, Nichole Donje, Melanie Ducharme, Lilian Engel, Isabelle Engel, Ana Flores, Susan E. Fox, Barbara Ganim, Ginny Fox and the Peace Flag Project , Susan Fossati, Ricky Gagnon, John Irwin, Kathy Horridge Kenney, Linda King, Michael Lapointe, Nora Lewis, Maaza, Saberah Malik, David Morse, Linda Phelan, Joanne Phillips, Lenka Kohoutova, Carol Rodi, Lynn Rosario, Barbara Rosenbaum, Erin Smithers, Karin Sprague, Sandy Salzillo-Shield, Donald Talbot, Jennifer Stratton, Rosemary Warburton; Munir Mohammed for Diocese of Providence, International Gallery for Heritage and Culture, and Mathewson Street Church/Headsup Inc; along with art, materials and information from the Rhode Island Department of Health Smoking Cessation Program.

In the Window: Mary Jane Begin

URI Providence Campus Library

Love Letters, or Other People’s Problems 

Installation Exhibit By Jacqueline Sylvia

September 2-26, 2014

Love Letters, or Other People’s Problems, investigates vulnerabilities of humanness.  Some such themes include the uncanny, environments of sarcasm, and the need to escape. Paranoia as a function reveals new forms of reality and the resistance to closure.  Paintings, sculpture, and assemblage are physical and often-supernatural gestures that are of my own created reality.  Apparitions, words, compiling tangible parts, challenge us.  But really, is it about other peoples’ problems or was it love all along?

Summer Map

Providence Art Windows and URI Feinstein Providence Campus Arts and Culture Program are participating in several summer conferences related to fiber. We welcome the Handweaver's Guild of America participants in Convergence,  with embroidery and fiber-related installations by by Samantha Fields, Corey Grayhorse, Ricki Katowicz and William Schaff.

In the URI Feinstein Campus Arts and Culture Library is Weaving Providence Together, from July 8-August 8, 2014. There will be a Gallery Night Reception July 17, 5-9pm, with a weaving demonstration of weaving, spinning, and fiber preparation. 

URI Providence Campus 1^st and 2^nd floor Gallery 80 Washington Street Providence. Hours: M-TH 9-9, F&S 9-4 closed Sunday (evening and weekend summer hours may vary) uri.artsandculture@gmail.com  www.uri.edu/prov/arts


And a lovely review by Greg Cook in the Phoenix.

URI Feinstein Providence Campus

URI Feinstein Providence Campus Arts and Culture Program Presents:

Weaving Providence Together

curated by Jan Doyle, David Lima and Richard Muto

Selected fiber works by the weavers, spinners, and dyers of the Octagon House. The Octagon House is located in Carolina, RI and houses the Carolina Fiber and Fiction Center which offers a master weaving program under Jan Doyle, spinning instruction with Richard Muto, and for those who desire to spin their yarns with words Grace Farrell leads "Tuesdays at 10", a lively and supportive creative writing class.

When looking at this window on Washington Street, please also go inside to see the URI Providence Campus 1^st and 2^nd floor Gallery, 80 Washington Street Providence

Hours: M-TH 9-9, F&S 9-4 closed Sunday (evening and weekend summer hours may vary)

For more information: 

 uri.artsandculture@gmail.com  www.uri.edu/prov/arts

Fulton Street

Samantha Fields

Triptych with 206,720 beads
recovered afghan, beads, 11’h x 7’w x2.5’d

About the Work

The work often begins with salvaged afghans. Reminiscent of a near past, the afghan isnostalgic but not ‘beautiful.’ It is often 
‘garish’ in color and made from synthetic acrylic yarn; so while it is hand-made and a reminder of the domestic, it is also reminiscent of mass production and industrialization. The afghan is kitsch, considered lowbrow living at the bottom of the hierarchy of taste as well as the hierarchy of craft. It is imbued with the culture of daily life, referring to our humanness in both its making and use. As a multimedia fiber artist, I engage with, weaving, beading, embroidery, crochet, and sewing as both an aesthetic and conceptual strategy. Through these modes of making, I explore different
social constructs associated with the decorative: gender, class, professional/hobbyist, the hierarchical categories of taste and morality, and craft and art.

About the Artist

For more information about Samantha Fields work, please go to samanthafields.com

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Eddy Street

Corey Grayhorse

Imaginary Reality

rainbow hair, wallpaper, color photographs, white hair, paper

About the Work & the Artist

I was born in Sunny Los Angeles, California in 1980 and found

 myself later relocating to Providence, Rhode Island in 2001. In being a native Californian I feel both my culture and environment have strongly influenced my art. My desire to capture imaginative composition led me to a study of photography throughout all of high school and later at Santa Monica College. There, I gained a much needed knowledge of the structure and science of photographic arts. After gaining a strong foundation I began to infuse my work with the color and flavor of my eclectic and eccentric imag

ination.

My work is contemporary and studied; everything is by design. A wide-ranging influence of styles in art, photography, fashion, creative locations, and set design, as well as traditional and pop culture inform my perspective. My trademarks of color, composition, and lighting are apparent as consistent threads throughout my work. All of these serve as a strong narrative in each piece.

Attention to detail and artful manipulation of the medium elevate my work beyond just photography. This process involves the     creation of building sets, designing costumes and scouting unique locations. Each element is thought out and carefully placed as part of the story. In a sense, these sets and locations are installations and a platform for performance art constructed and acted solely by myself and my subjects. Through the addition of characters, my portraits show a deep interest in the human expression. Through the lens I create strange beauty and satire, eliciting emotional and social responses. Frozen in time through photography, the work becomes a window into a fantastic dream world, drawing my 

audience in.

In my world I take these icons from their original context and superimpose them into a new one, contrasting the traditional with the contemporary at times. My images are fresh and lively, and it is clear that I have as much fun making them, as the spectator has viewing them.

For more about the artist.

203 Westminster Street

William Schaff

Embroidered Jackets

embroidery floss on jackets

About the Work

....a little bit about the jackets....

Two examples of my seeing if I could do this embroidery thing. A lovely way to not feel like I am wasting time if I am watching television. The Pieta piece is just me tackling a traditional, and beautiful, subject in art. While the “Chop Chop” patch is a now retired jacket from my earlier days in the What Cheer? Brigade. Providence’s own 20 piece renegade brass band.

About the Artist

Warren, R.I., artist, William Schaff is a mess. Much of his art deals with debt and loss, as well as the consequences of, and responses to, human violence. Stories from the Old Testament and memories learned from The Holocaust are recurrent in his work. A graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art, Schaff has exhibited and lectured at numerous institutions including the United States Air Force Academy, the Rhode Island School of Design, Amherst College, and East Carolina University. With all that said, he manages to create lots of artwork for different folk. From private commissions, gallery exhibits, and fine authors, to such notable independent musicians as Okkervil River, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Songs: Ohia, and many more. The boy has chops! Chops and debt! Working hard at avoiding debt collectors and making as much art as possible before they catch up with him, this rascal is just trying to keep his lights on, his car insured and his mortgage paid. Well, one out of three ain’t bad..God Bless you, William Schaff

For more information about the work of William Schaff, please go to 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Schaff

https://www.flickr.com/photos/samsa1973/

191 Westminster Street

Ricky Katowicz

Windfalls or: What Passes Through The Needle’s Eye

Crinoline, thread, paper, paint, fabric, filler, bucket, bottle, syringe

About the Work

The large stitched portraits represent the moment in time that Amanda Clayton, Urooj Khan, and Abraham Shakespeare each received a substantial monetary prize by result of playing the lottery. The bucket, bottle, and syringe symbolize the tragic end that each faced shortly after winning. The glittering pillows are meant to signify the excitement of easy money while simultaneously relating, in form, to the stones of Shirley Jackson’s famous short story, The Lottery.

About the Artist

Ricky spends late evenings in his basement studio, using the sewing machine as a drawing tool. In addition, he creates noise and visuals for an experimental group called Wind & Ghosts, performs with an international puppet troupe called Big Nazo, and spends every day designing girls toys for Hasbro. He lives in Cranston, RI with his wife, daughter, cockatiel, and dwarf hamster. His work can be seen at his personal blog, in the Todd Oldham board book - Sundance Film Festival A-Z, and on toy shelves around the world.

For more about Ricky's work, please go here.

Rhode Island Housing

Community Prep Collaborative Piece

Collaborative Observations of the Ordering Principles 
of Symmetry, Geometry, and Nature 
(a Kaleidoscopic Research Investigation, Pilot II)

Materials: acrylic paint, ink, paper, graphite, and wood panel

About the Work & the Artists

Amy Leidtke, Janine A. Lee, and the fifth grade class at Community Preparatory School, including, Sophia-Joy Agbelese, Amida Akpan, Tessah Almonacy, Maeve Collins, Lesley Flores, Quincy Griffin, David Gutierrez, Ger Lee, Tamira Lopes, Yasira Paulino, Deijah Prak-Preaster, Jalia Ramos, Robert Rosas, Gianny Santos, Carina Santos, Irca Sian, Jasper Summers

This collaborative artwork was created by seventeen G5 
Community Preparatory School students, along with Arts Educator, Janine A. Lee and Master Teaching Artist | Industrial Designer | Educator, Amy Leidtke. It represents the culmination of a multiple phase project, developed to activate children’s minds and hands in meaningful academically integrated curriculum that is engaging, fun, and creative.


For more about Community Prep and this project, please go to:

http://www.communityprep.org/schoollife/creativearts.html

http://www.amyleidtke.com

More reflections from the students and instructors:

Student Reflection: “This experience changed the way I look at the world. You realize how many shapes and details there are everywhere. If you look closer at your surroundings there’s a whole other world of shapes and colors that you can’t imagine. I didn’t know what I was capable of and Ms. Amy and Ms. Lee helped me find what I could do. The geometry that was mixed in help me comprehend shapes more. …(This project) helped me feel like I was doing a great job and (gave) me confidence.” – Maeve, Grade 5

Art Teacher's Reflection: “Amy initiated us working together and I have been grateful and fortunate to welcome her into my creative arts classroom ever since. She is an exceptional artist and designer. She provides my students with the opportunity to interact with a professional who views them as young artists she can inspire and who can inspire her. Amy is a guiding force who leads us to inquiry, investigation, exploration and discovery. Through working with her have we been exposed to the world of design thinking, process and work; sharing that with others both within and outside of our school community. Every project exchange with Amy is a valuable, rewarding and unforgettable experience. It is through RISCA funding that these experiences are possible for Community Preparatory School.” – Janine A. Lee, Community Preparatory School Arts Educator

Master Teaching Artist's Reflection: “As a professional industrial design practitioner, artist, and RISD faculty member, one of my goals is to practice ‘community-engaged scholarship’ (Boyer, 1996). [1] I believe this work, which is focused on researching and designing academically integrated arts curriculum and products, in the pursuit of producing educational ‘gifts’, is an important way to positively impact the lives of young citizens in Rhode Island.

Children benefit from access to practicing artists and designers, and I am happy that my background, education, faculty position, and research interests make it possible for me to serve in this role.  Children need greater access to opportunities to experience the arts in meaningful and multidisciplinary ways.

It is remarkably rewarding to co-create things with children and teachers! Janine is easy to work with and an amazingly capable and multidisciplinary arts educator. She is great with her students, patient, firm, and caring. The collaborative partnership that we developed together over the past several years is one that I highly value. She has been so generous to welcome me into her classroom, an environment that I consider to be crucial to the successful development of my work, as a designer and as an artist. 

It is important to note that the experiences we create in her arts classroom at Community Preparatory School are partially supported by RISCA funding. The funding for this particular project partially covered time and materials. Thank you to RISCA for helping to support this form of work.” – Reflection from Amy Leidtke

Photo credit: Amy Leidtke

Spring and Summer 2014

Spring and summer will bring color, beaded, threaded, embroidered, shredded and blinged out textiles to downtown Providence for the warm walking and viewing months of Providence Art Windows. Artists committed so far are Corey Grayhorse, Samantha Fields and Ricky Katowicz. Corey Grayhorse illustrates “nail culture” with her multimedia installation of her signature photography on Eddy Street within Two Brothers Beauty Supply. Corey worked with the owner of Two Brothers in utilizing supplies of rainbow hair extensions to round out her piece. Ricky Katowicz machine embroiders tales of lottery highs and lows at 191 Westminster Street. Samantha Fields dis-assembles a rainbow afghan, a symbol of kitsch and elevates it with threading  with 206,720 beads. Installations start popping up
April 7th and continue through the month of May, and lasting through September. More information and a map to follow, updated as new installations and committed artists appear.

URI Library

Jade Sisti

The Red Series
oil, acrylic, mixed media

About the Work

“Right before my eyes is what I’ve come to find. A light as bright as any light these 

eyes of mine could hope a light might be.” -Amon Tobin

Light is its strongest when it is about to die, pouring over us in a warm and comforting embrace. Hues fading into shades and beams of radiance glisten in its last moments of glory. Red in its most pure and primary form resembles that of a dying sun, a sun providing that of a warm and reassuring notion that it will return. My work captures that single expression or emotion, simplified to highlight that moment in time, threatened by the realization that the moment will end, yet excited by the prospect that it can be reinvented. The intention is not to mourn the loss, but to embrace the possibilities. 

About the Artist

Jade Sisti is an Art Teacher at East Providence High School and a prolific painter. She is a ‘Bubble’ of enthusiasm. Jade encourages and inspires her students to create and to dream.She works tirelessly to present their work in the school, the community, and at everyopportunity to aide in their growth and advancement.