CULTURE SCENE and SEEN
Enthusiasts & Creatives Across the Circuit
SEPTEMBER 28, 2022
Photograph by Rosamund Purcell - Addison Gallery of American Art.
The Dry Salvages Festival — A Celebration of T. S. Eliot
The land at 18 Edgemoor Road was approximately 1.5 acres of boulders, with the house built into a crevice between two outcroppings. The house, constructed by the Eliot family, originally had ocean views on three sides as no trees existed on the land of boulders.
Photo taken after the performance, left to right: James Lever, author and MC; Malcolm Ingram, Dana Hawkes, manager of T. S. Eliot house and the festival, and Johanna Day. Acknowledgement also to Fiona Atkinson and Judith Hooper of the T.S. Eliot Foundation.
During the weekend of September 24-25, the Dry Salvages Festival swept through Gloucester venues, offering numerous ways for the community to connect with this great poet who drew lifelong inspiration from Cape Ann. Eliot enthusiasts even ventured out to that outcropping of rocks named The Dry Salvages, and could relive the sailing excursions that young Eliot made from the shores of Eastern Point Gloucester.
Saturday night was the theatrical recital at Gloucester Stage, with actors Johanna Day and Malcolm Ingram performing a script incorporating many of Eliot's poems. The musicality and profundity of his verse were in resonance.
The Dry Salvages.
Verse from Eliot's Dry Salvages:
Fare forward. O voyagers, O seamen, You who came to port, and you whose bodies Will suffer the trial and judgement of the sea, Or whatever event, this is your real destination.
Left: Dana Hawkes begins a house tour with history of the Eliot family, and then takes the group through the spacious original rooms as well as the renovated sections needed to convert house into a writers' retreat. Right: The one window in the Edgemoor house room where young Tom Eliot spent his summers, with the view he gazed upon during his many years in Gloucester. Although his view had few trees and reached to the ocean.
A hearty boat load of Eliot enthusiasts heading out to the Dry Salvages, with commentation by Jack Batchelder.
Power and Perspective Opens at Peabody Essex Museum
Lynda Roscoe Hartigan, Director and CEO of PEM, welcomes the press to view this major show,featuring photographs from the 19th Century taken in China, and curated with many artifacts from PEM's vast collection.
Co-curators of Power and Perspective Karina Corrigan (top left photo on the left), the H.A. Crosby Forbes Curator of Asian Export Art and Stephanie Hueon Tung (top left, center, and right), the Byrne Family curator of Photography guide assembled press through the galleries.
Land, Mark opening reception at the Cultural Center at Rocky Neck
Land, Mark curator Ginger Myhaver welcomes the crowd and artists at the opening reception. Ginger is framed by detailed enlargements of Map of the World by Caroline Bagenal. Exhibition runs through October 23.
Artist Sarah Trahan with her work.
Participating artists Beatrice Modisett (center) and Hugo Pellinen (right).
Lower right: Rosamond Purcell standing in front of large photograph of herself, in the advent of a career that included the decaying states of manmade and natural objects.
Rosamond Purcell Opening Reception
The large upper level of the Addison Gallery is dedicated to Rosamond Purcell's first retrospective show and covers the artist's career from the late 1960s to the current day. A large crowd turned up for the opening reception, moving through the galleries, taking it all in. Rosamond was affably fielding questions and catching up with friends and scholarly types, in abundance.
Top left: Rosamond Purcell in front of her wall size assemblage. Above: details from two of Purcell’s photographs in the exhibition.
Cheryl Dyment Show Opens at RAA&M
Cheryl Dyment (left) with details from two of her paintings.
Cheryl Dyment welcomed many friends to the festive opening reception for her solo show at Rockport Art Association & Museum. Gordon and Judith Massman, Karen Watson and Karen Matthews, were among the turnout. Cheryl's vibrant works light up the gallery, her show continues through October 6.
Cheryl (left) with Gordon and Judith Massman.
Swimmers’ Stories at Shalin Liu
Lynne Cox (left) and Patricia Hanlon, are two dedicated swimmers who also became authors, with tales from the sea which fascinated a large turnout on September 17. The event was produced by Literary Cape Ann, and hosted by one of its founders, Rae Francoeur (standing). Literary Cape Ann was founded to fill the void after Toad Hall Bookstore closed in 2017.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
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CULTURE SCENE: SEPTEMBER 14
Jonathan Latiano Begins his Goetemann Residency
Ruth Mordecai, Jonathan Latiano, Kathy Archer.
The latest Goetemann Resident Artist has arrived on Cape Ann, launching his month-long project with a September 7 presentation at the Cultural Center. The audience was enthralled with Jonathan Latiano's photographic record of fantastical installations, often room-size and constructed of unexpected materials, such as salt and Fordite. The residency program offers a month of free creative generation, with no thematic limitations. There is plenty of community excitement over this project, now in the works at Ocean Alliance.
Jonathan Latiano’s opening presentation at the Cultural Center on September 7.
With Kate Seidman and Ruth Mordecai.
Perri Lynch Howard Completes Her Goetemann Residency
Perri Howard, photographed in the midst of her installation at Ocean Alliance, produced a multi-disciplinary project during her Goetemann Residency. The spectrographs created a visual counterpoint to a haunting soundscape, which she made by combining original whale recordings with ambient sounds of bell buoys, ocean waves, hydrophone recordings of ship traffic, and NOAA weather broadcasts for Gloucester waters and Stellwaen Bank. The spectrographs enabled tracing of the whales' repetitive auditory patterns, considered to be "songs", which were hidden within the recordings. Perri is originally from Marblehead and now lives and works in Twisp, Washington. Her next big adventure is on a vessel with 30 other artists, headed to the Arctic Circle. To follow her work: www.perrilynchhoward.com.
Vincent Castagnacci Lecture at CAM Includes Reunion
As part of the ongoing exhibition at Cape Ann Museum, Vincent Castagnacci: Notes from a Quarry, the artist gave a presentation which wonderfully traced the themes and continuum's in his work. Two school chums were in the audience.
Left to right: Kathleen Adams, Director of Music, Annisquam Village Church; Joy Buell, Artist and COSMOS Correspondent; Vincent Castagnacci. Forever linked by their days at the Boston Museum School.
Press Boat Circles the Schooners
On Thursday evening September 1, the first of the fleet of schooners began their elegant arrival for Gloucester's Schooner Festival. The provided Press Boat was a helpful resource for photographers in search of "at sea" closeups. The photo above includes not only the skipper, right, but a rare sighting of the deadline-driven photographer for the Gloucester Daily Times. Sitting in the bow, one can see Michelle Williams, Board Chair of Discover Gloucester. Other fearless reporters on board were filmmaker Kim Smith, Tess McGolgan, Executive Director of Discover Gloucester, and COSMOS Culture Scene correspondent. No cell phones were lost at sea while many a closeup was captured, as seen with the Bald Eagle stern shot, one that would have eluded an aerial drone camera.
The actors take their bows, then on to the opening night reception!
Norm Jones Brings The Tempest to Gordon College Theater
Director Norm Jones has been teaching theater at Gordon College since 1985, directing 54 plays during his tenure. The Tempest is his 11th Shakespeare production. He has been the force behind 15 premieres or commissioned plays, and in 1992 founded History Alive, a theater company based in Salem, Mass. Norm is a playwright and actor, with credits at Gloucester Stage Company and Gordon College productions. He has also performed an original one-person script as Nathaniel Hawthorne, in dozens of different settings.
The current production of The Tempest is a hearty delivery of the Bard's classic, acted by current students in the college's highly respected theater arts department as well as a handful of its graduates. The costumes were designed by Anna-Maria Forger, with three of her standouts shown below.
Prospero, played by Drew Cleveland (2017).
Caliban, played by Drew Scott (2025).
Ariel, played by Gail Maxwell (2024).