fb-pixelPine Manor professor uses campus as a backdrop to sculpture - The Boston Globe Skip to main content
MARK YOUR CALENDAR

Pine Manor professor uses campus as a backdrop to sculpture

"Sleepwalker Fountain" by Yetti Frenkel at the Hess Gallery.Handout

CAMPUS INSPIRATION From Carolyn Wirth’s first glimpse of Pine Manor College, where she is an adjunct professor of fine art, she had a vision for the show she might someday curate there. “The campus is beautiful, with specimen trees and outcroppings of Roxbury puddingstone,” she said. “It seemed to cry out for an exhibition that takes advantage of the surrounding landscape.”

And now, as curator of the college’s Hess Gallery, Wirth is finally seeing that vision come to light. “The Nature Show,” an indoor-outdoor exhibit of works by 25 members of the New England Sculptors Association, opened Aug. 28 and will remain on view until Nov. 4.

Advertisement



“The show represents a broad range of expression and subject matter. Some pieces very seriously consider the natural world and others are more humorous and quirky,” Wirth said. Materials include welded steel, carved stone, carved wood, cast iron, ceramics, bronze, and plaster.

Hess Gallery is located on the Pine Manor College campus at 400 Heath St., Chestnut Hill. For gallery hours and more information, call 617-731-7157 or go to www.pmc.edu/hess-gallery.

HORSE TALK 6 Bridges Gallery presents “Enamored of Horses, Barns & Farms” an exhibit of works by Alice Shafer, a photographer and digital artist formerly of Wayland and now living in Acton. Shafer, a Minnesota native, attempts through her work to preserve the fast-disappearing vistas of farms, fields and barns. The photos in her current exhibition were taken in Vermont, New Hampshire, Tennessee, Kentucky and Ireland. The exhibit, which encompasses photography and digital art over several years, opens Aug. 30 and continues through Oct. 1 . The gallery is located at 77 Main St., Maynard. An opening reception will be held on Saturday, Sept. 10, 7 to 9 p.m.

SOARING ABOVE Friends of the Oxbow National Wildlife Refuge invite anyone interested in learning more about nighthawks to join them on Saturday, Sept. 3, from 6:30 p.m. to dark observing the migration of the Common Nighthawk through the Nashua River Valley. In past years, when the weather and insects cooperated, flocks of as many as 100 birds were seen overhead; other years, the birds were rarer and harder to spot. Meet near the end of Still River Depot Road in Harvard, before the entrance to the Oxbow Refuge. Bring binoculars, field guides and a chair if so desired. For more information, contact Don MacFarlane at 978-897-7567.

Advertisement



STICKS TOGETHER Tower Hill Botanic Garden presents an unusual outdoor installation by artist Patrick Dougherty. He spent weeks on site collecting saplings and has bent and woven them into unique architectural sculptures designed to relate to both the natural landscape and manmade environment around them. Over the last 30 years, he has built more than 250 of these works which are on exhibit worldwide. The installation will be on view through 2017, though an exact end date depends on the durability of the materials. Tower Hill Botanic Garden is located at 11 French Drive, Boylston. For admission fees, hours and more information, call 508-869-6111 or go to www.towerhillbg.org.

ABOUT A FAMILY New Repertory Theatre presents the Boston-area premiere of “Regular Singing” by Richard Nelson, performed Sept. 3 through 25 in the Charles Mosesian Theater at the Arsenal Center for the Arts, 321 Arsenal St., Watertown. The play tells the tale of a present-day family who gathers on the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination to celebrate the life of an ailing relative, with talking, eating, laughing, and singing in a snapshot that shows how family histories can intersect with the nation’s history. Tickets are $30 to $59 and may be purchased by calling the New Rep Box Office at 617-923-8487 or visiting www.newrep.org.

Advertisement



JAZZ TIME The Greg Abate Quartet, featuring Abate on saxophone, Matt DeChamplain on piano, Todd Baker on bass, and Gary Johnson on drums, performs at Amazing Things Arts Center on Saturday, Sept. 3, at 8 p.m. Tickets are $18 general admission; $17 seniors/students; $15 members; $9 children 12 and under. Amazing Things Arts Center is located at 160 Hollis St., Framingham. For tickets or more information, call 508-405-2787 or go to amazingthings.org.


Send ideas to nancyswest@gmail.com