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Curator’s Corner

May Day Artist Birthday: Cecilia Beaux

Monday, May 1, 2023 | Karl Cole

The American Renaissance was a period when more American artists traveled to Europe in order to enrich their artistic vision. They brought back such styles as Impressionism, Dark Impressionism, B ...

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Curator’s Corner

Women's (Art) History Month 2021 II

Monday, March 15, 2021 | Karl Cole

If anyone documented the human (women’s) condition extensively, it was artist Isabel Bishop. Her sensitive paintings and prints of working women during the Great Depression (1929–1940) and ...

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Curator’s Corner

Women's (Art) History Month 2021 I

Monday, March 8, 2021 | Karl Cole

Although there are records of women artists from antiquity, women artists between the 1400s and 1700s in the West were either considered anomalies or miracles. The advent of artists' guilds during the ...

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Curator’s Corner

Women's (Art) History Month 2020 I

Monday, March 2, 2020 | Karl Cole

Since this year is the 100th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which granted women the right to vote, it is especially fitting to observe Women’s History ...

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Curator’s Corner

And This Is a Portrait of Whom?

Monday, June 12, 2017 | Karl Cole

I don’t often laugh about art history (seriously!), but now and then one just can’t help it. With this group of “portraits,” I had to keep in mind that: A) the people who bough ...

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Curator’s Corner

The Artistic Legacy of Conquest, part 2

Tuesday, March 14, 2017 | Karl Cole

This week's look at Spanish Colonial art continues, inspired by the exhibit Highest Heaven, currently on view at the Worcester Art Museum. ...

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Curator’s Corner

Hierarchical Size

Tuesday, October 14, 2014 | Karl Cole

Hierarchy is the level of importance allotted to an object, or, for the sake of this posting, a person. Hierarchical size deals with the principle of design known as proportion. Proportion has to do w ...

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Curator’s Corner

Drawing

Monday, September 15, 2014 | Karl Cole

I’m showing you Ruth Henshaw Bascom’s work as a celebration of the new show in the Davis Art Gallery, Drawing: The Art of Making Marks. Drawing was not really considered a “fine ...

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Curator’s Corner

Happy Fourth of July!

Monday, July 7, 2014 | Karl Cole

I’m celebrating the 4th of July by showing you one of the many portraits Gilbert Stuart did of our first president, George Washington. I hate to be an overly sappy art historian, but one of my s ...

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Curator’s Corner

Unsung Heroes

Monday, June 23, 2014 | Karl Cole

There are many ways to be a hero. I by no means denigrate our men and women in the armed services, who have given their all recently in two wars (one of which should never have happened). But, there a ...

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Curator’s Corner

American Artist Supports American Art

Tuesday, June 3, 2014 | Karl Cole

I guess it doesn’t need to be said, that, in the history of art, there are many artists who just don’t get massive exposure. Although they might often be lauded in their day, their works d ...

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Curator’s Corner

Fantasy Christmas Present III

Monday, December 23, 2013 | Karl Cole

I love miniatures from early American art! I dearly want a miniature of myself hanging from my loved one’s keychain as a Christmas present! However, miniature artists are few and far betwee ...

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Curator’s Corner

African American History Month 2013 I

Monday, February 4, 2013 | Karl Cole

Once again we honor National African American History Month. I don’t think it can be argued that, despite the fact that we recognize the contemporary accomplishments of African American artists, ...

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Curator’s Corner

Mexican Artists in America

Monday, September 24, 2012 | Karl Cole

I’d like to point out in this blog post the contribution of Mexican artists to American art since long before many parts of the country were colonized as American states. The Spanish tried to lu ...

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Curator’s Corner

Guess Who?

Tuesday, May 8, 2012 | Karl Cole

As a painter myself, I find it fascinating to watch a famous painter’s progress from early to late work. In the case of Edgar Degas (1834–1917), I’m always over the top because he is ...

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Curator’s Corner

A Forgotten Woman Artist

Monday, January 30, 2012 | Karl Cole

I always like to introduce you to artists who, I think, have been marginalized in “official” art history surveys of western (or non-western for that matter) art. Because Paris was has been ...

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