HarborArts Presents:
State of the Arts

Hosted by Trifecta Editions
at David Buckley Borden‘s Hibernaculum

Thursday, July 23rd. 6-9pm
The Innovation and Design Building
1 Design Center Place, Suite 142

State of the Arts features some of Boston’s most inspiring creatives, ranging from studio artists to curators to arts administrators. Multiple speakers present their creative practice in Pecha Kucha format (20 slides, 20 seconds each, 6:40 total time) providing practical insight into their role in the Boston arts community.

Thursday, July 23rd.
Doors at 6. Presentations at 7.
Free event. Refreshments provided.

Featuring Presentations by:
HarborArts
Michele L’Heureux
Pat Dagle of Blanc Gallery
Dana Woulfe and Josh Falk of Studio Fresh Boston
Thomas Young Gallery
Pennie Taylor
Brian Kane
…and others…

Cinemarina
Wednesday, 6.24.15

Cinemarina is a bike-in movie event by the waterfront, right here in the Shipyard! On Wednesday, June 24, HarborArts will be screening “The Goonies”, a 1985 American adventure comedy film directed by Richard Donner. Guests will enjoy the film on a massive 25-foot inflatable screen powered by state-of-the-art projection and audio equipment, providing a top-shelf outdoor cinematic experience to the public.

BRING YOUR CAMP CHAIR / BEACH CHAIR / HAMMOCK / ETC!
Stay comfy when you come to HarborArts.  It’s an industrial shipyard, not a grassy field.

Visitors to the shipyard will walk or bike to the screening, which will start at 8:30pm, and concessions and chairs will be available to those who didn’t bring their own. The event is completely free, but donations will kindly be accepted to support the sustainability of public art and arts programming in the Shipyard Gallery.

Friday 6.19.15
HarborArts Presents: Set Off the Summer
Boston Harbor Shipyard & Marina, BLDG 32
256 Marginal St. East Boston, MA 02128
7-11pm | 21+ | $10 Suggested Donation

Eastie week will kick-off at HarborArts, with a Summer in the Shipyard kick-off and pop-up exhibition.
Join us for Set Off the Summer, an evening of art, music, and libations in an immense, raw industrial space called BLDG 32.

This BLDG 32 showcase will include a curated pop-up exhibition featuring works by compelling local contemporary artists, paired with some of Boston’s freshest talent in the music scene.

***FEATURED ARTISTS***

Rachel Tine
Hazel Ang
Charlene Liska
Mia Roseblatt Tinkjian
Erika Hess
Marjorie Kaye
George Shaw
Bo Petran
Skye Schirmer
Dorothy Pilla
Ana Maria Restrepo
Stephen Godlieb
& featuring the work of artists from ArtLifting!

Sponsored by:

Boston Harbor Shipyard & Marina
The Boston Harbor Association TBHA
Strewnshank Productions
Charlestown AV
and Others

Hello creative people!

HarborArts is putting on a summer kickoff event & pop-up exhibition on June 19 from 6-11pm here in the shipyard, in BLDG 32!  We’ve got space for up to 10 artists to showcase their work.  Here are the basic event details:

Set Off the Summer
EASTIE WEEK POP-UP • JUNE 19, 2015 – 6 to 11pm

Eastie Week is a week-long series of events highlighting the rich cultural
diversity of our waterfront neighborhood. Eastie week will begin at
HarborArts, with a Summer in the Shipyard kick-off and pop-up exhibition.
Join us for Set Off the Summer, an evening of art, music, and libations in an immense, raw industrial space called BLDG 32. This BLDG 32 showcase will include a curated pop-up exhibition featuring works by compelling, local contemporary artists, paired with some of Boston’s freshest talent in the music scene. With an estimated attendance of 400 guests, the event will serve as our annual kickoff of the HarborArts Summer in the Shipyard 2015.

Artist info:

• No fee to enter.
• Accepting paintings, photography, sculpture (wall hanging, free standing, or hanging sculpture), projection, installations.
• All work must be submitted by email to alice.harborarts@gmail.com with images or a website that reflects your work by June 3 at 11pm
• Works for sale should be priced to sell ranging from $150 – $1200, with 20% of the sale price being a donation to our 501(c)(3) non-profit.
• Hanging days: Wednesday June 17 to Thursday June 18
• Work must come down and be picked up by Sunday, June 21 at 5pm
• There will be no admission charge at the event for participating artists, and artists will receive 2 additional free tickets to the event.

Please Submit:

• The work or works you wish to enter with digital images of the work you are submitting for the exhibition
• A statement that includes the medium and price of each piece
• Your contact information including an email and phone number
• (Optional) A website or additional images of your work

If you have further questions, please shoot us an email at
alice.harborarts@gmail.com

We look forward to working with you!

Warmly,
HarborArts Curatorial Crew

HarborArts Co-Director Rebecca V. has a guest post up on the highly regarded arts and philosophy blog Aesthetics For Birds, drawing inspiring conclusions regarding the possibilities of contemporary painting from a wide range of influences and experiences, including William Gibson, Sherri Irving, and painting shows recently on display at Boston’s ICA and NYC’s MOMA.  She writes:

“The fetishization of originality has not only lead to painting needing to be more than painting, but also to the disengagement of a broader audience with contemporary works of art. Pushing the boundaries for the sake of originality often results in pushing away a potentially interested and engaged public.”

Rebecca’s research into the prospects of the art experience and the institutions and social forces that shape it is an important element of HarborArts’ evolution towards an Public Art institution that protects and expands the power of art to serve and empower all communities.  Read more here.

We had an amazing time at PORT CALL last Saturday.  Over 350 people came to the Shipyard to join us for a celebration of HarborArts’ new space in Building 32 and the programming we have planned for it.  We were delighted to see our old friends and make plenty of new ones, and we successfully raised funding for several artist stipends in the coming year!

Ten local artists displayed works in a pop-up gallery space constructed for the night.  Paintings, prints, photography, sculpture, and video art shared part of the 16,000 sq ft warehouse, along with a bar stocked by our friends at Dirty Water Distillery and a table of delicious bite catered by our good neighbor KO Pies.

DJs Ricardo De Lima AKA Oxycontinental and Nick Follet inhabited the Circus For Construction and spun a delightful mix for our guests all night long.

And so we danced.

and danced!

Several people were instrumental for making this event happen and deserve our greatest regard:  a very special thanks to our Curator, Penelope Taylor, and big hugs to Phil Gutowski, Ali Wisch, Davis Schirmer, and Andrew Martin for all the help putting things together and taking things back apart.  A tip of our knit hats to the gracious artists who participated in the show: David Buckley Borden, AJ Liberto, !ND!V!DUALS, Françios de Costerd, Genesis Báez, Skye Asta Devine Schirmer, Paola de la Calle, Marjorie Kaye, George Shaw, and Rebecca Victoria Millsop.  Of course, we couldn’t have had such a successful event without the help of our dedicated volunteer crew!

Last but not least, thanks to our community supporters and sponsors (in no particular order):  Boston Harbor Shipyard and Marina, Bob Barrett and the Building 12 crew, East Boston Main Streets, KO Pies, Dirty Water Distillery, Strewnshank Productions, Grain Woodshop, Karma Crew Yacht Charters, Brilliance Tattoo, Liz LaManche, Steve Asaro, the Institute of Contemporary Arts, East Boston Oysters, Logan Beauty, Green Bean Food Truck, Dough Pizza, and Boston Brewin.

All photos: credit to Ali Wisch

Over the course of two sunny autumn days, Elize installed her latest work over the side shop door of Praxis Fabrication.

Self-trained in traditional painting, Elize creates organic and engaging work that carries strong influences from a vast range of mediums and cultures, from Victorian illustrations to WWII tattooing and Japanese pop. Her vibrant ink adorns the skin of those lucky enough to be her clients at Brilliance Tattoo in Allston, MA, where Elize is owner of one of the few female-operated tattoo parlors in the area.  Apart from her busy entrepreneurial schedule, she still somehow finds time for a successful fine arts practice (check out her Etsy shop) and the occasional mural.

Be sure to wander down to the graving dock over by KO Pies during your next visit to the Shipyard Gallery to see Elize’s new work up on Building 17!

Nate also snapped some beautiful shots outside the photobooth.  There’s a number of portraits of our tireless volunteers,

and some cool pics of the jazz and R&B band that was playing in the pop-up gallery space:

Check out the full set on Nate’s HarborArts Festival Flickr page.  You can also see his other talented photography on his main Flickr page here.

Though we’re working on developing some of this fallow space into affordable and functional artist studios, currently there are only a few working artists in the shipyard.  Brandon Gatti, owner of Grain Wood Shop, is one of them.

Last year, Brandon took on the herculean task of cleaning up the second floor of Building 35, former home of a naval machinery testing shop.  Brandon cleared out the crumbling walls, piles of rusting machinery, a few families of squatter raccoons, and literally tons of debris from the decades-vacant 8000 square foot space before building out his bright and open custom wood shop and furniture showroom.

Brandon is a born craftsperson.  He has moved through his life with the eye of someone who sees how things fit together: how objects, however disparate or abandoned they may seem, can be brought into the realm of beauty and use by his hand.  The Beetle Cat sailboat awaiting refinishing on his shop floor speaks to his past as a boat builder and restorer, and the airy and functional layout of Grain makes perfect sense when you learn he has an architecture degree.

Specializing in reclaimed woods and live-edge slabs, Brandon brings furniture to an interactive and subjective level.  Clients can browse his hand-picked selection of one-of-a-kind pieces of lumber, and Brandon can create a custom work or set of works from the wood picked by the client.

Grain Wood Shop was a huge contributor to HarborArts Festival 2014, and Brandon opened up his space to festgoers as a sort of one-man open studios.  All day, people passed though his shop admiring the raw wood slabs and finished furniture on display.  “I received a great response from the community about opening a custom woodworking shop in the area,” he said about the festival turnout.  “Over seven hundred people came up to see the new shop and showroom. It’s great being in Boston Harbor Shipyard & Marina and being in East Boston.”

We’re hoping Brandon’s shop serves as an example of the sort of fine artistic and entrepreneurial spaces the shipyard can engender, and we’re thrilled to have him as a neighbor and supporter.  Check out his website here and stay in touch via his Facebook page, where you can see a good bit of his recent work and process.