Local colors

FITCHBURG – The 84th Regional Exhibition of Art and Craft at Fitchburg Art Museum lives up to its title.

Artists who submitted work for consideration had to be regional, as in living or working within 30 miles of the museum. But the geographic restriction proved to be no impediment and the exhibition showcases the tremendous strength and depth of artistic creation in Central Massachusetts.

“This is just a great day to kick off the season,” Nick Capasso, FAM’s director, said at the show’s June 21 opening reception. “It always happens near the first day of summer and the artists love it and the community loves it. It's very well-received and we're really proud of it.”

The museum’s galleries were packed with artists, their families and friends, art aficionados and members of the local community at the reception. One reason for such a large, appreciative crowd was that two other shows opened at the museum that evening. All three summer exhibitions run through Sept. 1.

Also opening was “Carrie Crane: Beyond Measure,” a fanciful interpretation of history and science based in part on items from FAM’s collection. Crane earned that solo slot as the first-prize winner in last year’s Regional Exhibition.

Showing in the Community Gallery on the museum’s first floor is “Call and Response: A Matter of Perspective,” an annual collaboration between ArtsWorcester and FAM that features 10 works from FAM’s permanent collection and 10 juror-selected works by ArtsWorcester members. This year’s theme was perspective, which artists were free to interpret in any way they liked.

The “Call and Response” exhibition this year offers a particularly good glimpse of two institutions working together, said Juliet Feibel, ArtsWorcester executive director. Candice Bancheri, who recently completed her tenure as FAM’s Terrana Curatorial Fellow, was the juror for the show. “She was one of the most thoughtful jurors we've had,” Feibel said. “When it came time to put their loan and the ArtsWorcester artworks she selected up at FAM, she did an outstanding job showing us how they relate to each other.”

The show gives the 10 ArtsWorcester artists a museum credential, which is one of the most important marks on an artist's résumé. “Being selected for this particular museum partnership brings each of these artists into what the museum calls its FAMily,” Feibel said.

The main show, the Regional Exhibition of Art and Craft, is one of the oldest juried exhibitions in New England. “Fitchburg Art Museum has been engaged in this tradition for 84 years and we see it as a service to the artists and our community,” Capasso said, as he and I moved off to a gallery corner so he could be heard over the reception’s lively din. “Anybody who lives or works within 30 miles of Fitchburg, interpreted very loosely, can submit work to the show and it's a great opportunity for artists to have a professional museum exhibition and get some recognition and, especially at the opening, to network. This is like a gathering of the tribes here with all the different artists who come.”

This year’s Regional Exhibition juror was Aynel David Guerra, director and founder of A R E A, a multiformat and interdisciplinary gallery in SoWa, Boston’s art and design district. His organization focuses on artists of diverse social and cultural backgrounds. As happens each year, the best-in-show winner will be given a solo exhibition to run concurrently with the next year’s Regional Exhibition of Art and Craft. This year, that top award was bestowed upon Nathan Bentley of Manchester, New Hampshire, for his painting “Latr Regrt.”

“It’s from a body of work exploring the falsehoods of the American dream, our aspirations leading towards that and, ultimately, where we all fall short,” Bentley said, sounding perhaps a tad jaded for someone of the still-tender age of 28. “A lot of the imagery deals with coping mechanisms and failing social structures,” he said.

Bentley’s work — oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas — combines bold abstraction with adept photorealism. Images include a Budweiser can, a slice of pepperoni pizza, a wedding cake and the classic cartoon character Snoopy snoozing atop his doghouse.

“It’s the idea of marriage, monogamy, the white picket fence, all alluding to the American dream,” Bentley said. “It’s alcohol and food as coping mechanisms for unhappiness and you see a lot of imagery referencing past and present, and each piece has its own specific narrative derived from the text you see in the background.”

And when his name was announced as the top winner at the opening ceremony?

“I was very surprised,” he said. “It feels good. It’s really exciting.”

What about the sudden, unexpected prospect of having a solo show in a museum?

“I assume I’ll have to get to work and get quite a few more paintings done now,” he said.

The Regional Show juror each year is asked to take an inclusive approach, which helps explain the wide range of work in the show. “We only tell the juror two things: Pick the best work in your opinion and make sure that you honor traditional ways of art making at the same level that you honor the contemporary work because we want to make sure that all the artists in our region have an equal shot at this,” Capasso said.

So, along with Bentley’s abstract painting, there is meticulous craftsmanship on view. The best, in the juror’s view, was Jesse Shaw, who was awarded the exhibition’s craft prize for tall, graceful lamps of steam-bent ash. Even the lamps’ light-revealing shades, shaped to evoke fire, are made of paper-thin wood. They are labeled Prometheus 6 and Prometheus 7.

“They spiral and I wanted the wood shade to look like a flame and Prometheus was a demigod who came down and gave fire to man so I thought it was a fitting name,” Shaw said.

Sally B. Moore is a Regional Exhibition regular. She said she has been juried into the show three of the four times she’s entered in recent years. Moore, of Jamaica Plain, satisfies the show’s geographic restriction because she teaches art at Fitchburg State University. Her entry this year is a small human figure made of clay who carries a white turtle shell on his back.

“It’s an actual turtle shell that I got at a flea market for $5 about seven years ago,” Moore said. “It’s been kicking around my studio and I knew I wanted to do something with this bleached turtle shell.” She calls her half-turtle, half-man creation “Shell-shocked.”

“I was thinking of the political climate right now and that we all kind of feel a little shell-shocked and just wanting somewhere to hide, like in a nice bleached turtle shell,” she said.

Like Moore, award-winning Worcester photographer Louie Despres was not selected for a prize this time around, but he was pleased just to have a distinguished juror choose his work, two photographs in his signature stark but riveting style, for inclusion in the show.

“It’s a fabulous experience to be involved with all these wonderful artists,” he said. “It’s a really humbling experience because sometimes I create and I don’t think about how good or bad it is, but I just like putting stuff out there, so it’s nice when it gets recognized and be with all these great artists in this fabulous museum. Yeah, it’s wonderful.”

Here is a complete list of prize winners in the 84th Regional Exhibition of Art and Craft:

First Prize — Nathan Bentley for LATR REGRT, 2019, oil, acrylic, and spray paint on canvas.

Second Prize — Jenna Nastri for Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang, 2019, gouache and thread on paper.

Third Prize — Zoe Perry-Wood for Karman in Trans Colored Prom Dress, 2019, archival pigment print.

Sculpture Prize — Crystal Blanchflower for Tea 4 Two, 2019, installation/sculpture: vintage tea set, teacups, teapot, sugar and cream holders, vintage tea table, two vintage chairs, chalk paint, epoxy, wax, polymer clay, acrylic paint, sand, and pastel.

Saara Parker Painting Prize — Iris Osterman for Tidal Pool, 2018, oil on canvas.

Stephen Jareckie Photography Prize — Suzanne Révy for Blizzard, 2018, photograph, archival inkjet print.

Stephen Jareckie Photography Prize Honorable Mention — Simon H. Gregory for Moss Between Two Elements, 2018, digital photograph.

Stephen Jareckie Photography Prize Honorable Mention — Jonathan Lucas for Branding, 2018, silver gelatin print.

Voitto Jarvi Watercolor Prize — Kate Pritchard for Chewie, 2019, watercolor.

Peter McCollum Staff Prize — Merill Comeau for Family Ghosts, 2017, pencil, acrylic paint, paint marker on paper.

Craft Prize — Jesse Shaw for Prometheus Lamp #7, 2018.