SISTER SPIT and Brian Boldon

5 November - SISTER SPIT: The Next Generation comes to Chester College

Monday, November 5, 2007
9:00 pm - 11:00 pm
Dalrymple Lounge

SISTER SPIT: The Next Generation is hitting the road again, with a whole new all-girl lineup of zinesters, fashion plates, novelists, performance artists, slam poets and fancy scribblers. Inspired by the legendary Sister Spit Ramblin' Roadshow of the 90s, Sister Spit: The Next Generation is hauling a vanload of killer underground female talent across the USA and into your town. The latest gang hits the road in October 2007, a decade after the first Spit van set sail, carrying on the tradition of rowdy, raucous literary adventure. As they journey across the USA, they're joined by a rag tag bunch of special guests - old Spit travelers of yore, and contributors to the brand new feminist fashion anthology, It's So You. Come and meet your new favorite performers! (more)

Featuring Michelle Tea, Meliza Banales, Texta Queen, Dexter Flowers, Chelsea Starr, Tara Jepsen and Kat Marie Yoas.

Visit the Sister Spit: Next Generation website here.

6 November - Brian Boldon
Mixed media artist

On November 6 at 2:30 pm, Brian Boldon will give a public lecture in the conference room of Chester College of New England's Wadleigh Library. Boldon is a visiting artist, part of the college's Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Brian Boldon received a BS in Art from the University of Wisconsin in 1981 and an MFA from Rhode Island School of Art and Design in 1988. Boldon taught at Hamilton College in Clinton NY 1989-90 and headed the Ceramics Program at the University of Alaska Anchorage 1990-1995. Boldon currently is head of the Ceramics Program at Michigan State University. Most recently Boldon has developed new technologies for digital imaging on ceramics and glass, integrating digital media with tradition studio art practices.

Compass Rose interviews Brian Boldon

Compass Rose: When did you begin creating art, and what inspired you to do so?

Brian Boldon: I began in high school and always felt compelled to respond to my experiences through making objects and images. I began with an interest in building objects out of wood, clay and metal, and then explored drawing and painting.

CR: What kind of controversy have you encountered for the work you've created?

Boldon: My work does deal with subject matter that is challenging. I explore Issues of identity as it relates to the body offering artwork that that uses scientific and fragment images of the body to explore personal and cultural perceptions of the body. I have not experienced any controversy with my work, but I have encountered a resistance to some to the projects that I have produced.

CR: How did attending the Rhode Island School of Design affect your craft?

Boldon: RISD was an excellent experience for me. I was in the ceramics program, but found the dialog with all the graduate students, and the visiting artist program to affect my approach to making art the most. I have always been on the fringes of the field of Ceramics, more interested in mixed media, new media, and sculpture. RISD really opened up a new way for me to respond to contemporary art with a variety of media, and focused my intentions for my use of ceramics in the my work. (more)

Interview with Mitchell Clark, Call for Visual Art

30 October - Mitchell Clark
Ethnomusicologist, Composer, Curator

On October 30 at 2:30 pm, Mitchell Clark will give a public lecture in the conference room of Chester College of New England's Wadleigh Library. Chalfin is a visiting artist, part of the college's Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Trained as a composer and an ethnomusicologist, Mitchell Clark has been active as a writer about music and as a curator. Recently a Research Fellow in the department of musical instruments at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, he curated Sounds of the Silk Road: Musical Instruments of Asia (on view at the MFA, 2005-06) and wrote the book of the same title that accompanied the exhibition. As an ethnomusicologist he specializes in Chinese music and has written extensively about the qin, the classical Chinese seven-string zither. His publications have appeared in the books The Resonance of the Qin in East Asian Art (1999) and Sound and Light: La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela (1996), as well as in periodicals such as the Galpin Society Journal, Experimental Musical Instruments, and Nhac Viêt: The Journal of Vietnamese Music. Currently based in Providence, Rhode Island, he was recipient of the Fellowship in Music Composition from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts in 2002. As a composer, his studies included those with Alvin Lucier, Kenneth Gaburo, and Henry Brant, and recent activities have included performances throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia. His A Fine Day for the Curious (and Wet) has been included annually in WaterFire Providence since 2001. Additionally, he writes fiction and has published translations of Chinese poetry.


Compass Rose interviews Mitchell Clark:

Compass Rose: In general, who and what were your influences throughout school, and how did you inevitably end up studying music?

Mitchell Clark: Early on my interests were in science, but I enjoyed music a lot and at thirteen I got the idea that it was something I could do myself. I learned guitar, largely teaching myself, and immediately began composing instrumental pieces and songs. This quickly displaced my interest in science. As a composition student at conservatory I had the opportunity to study Korean music, and Asian music in general, and all this affected me deeply.

CR: How do you think being raised in New England influenced you growing up?

Clark: As I say, my early interests were science related, and my love was the biology of seashores. So my stomping grounds were the shores of Rhode Island and, in the summer, Maine. Who knows if I ever would have gone on to study marine biology, but there’s something about seashores that remains fundamental for me. Some of it is symbolic, perhaps—one world edging up against another—but for me its more textural, with all senses of perception involved. (more)


Call for Visual Art

Compass Rose, a journal of art and literature, seeks visual art submissions for its 2008 issue. While we consider all mediums, we can only print black and white images. Please send 1 to 3 high resolution images on a CD as well as a short bio to:

Compass Rose

Chester College of New England

40 Chester Street, Chester NH 03036

We cannot accept submissions as email attachments.

Angela Balcita, Liz Chalfin, In The Margins and a Call for Visual Art

25 October - Angela Balcita
Creative Nonfiction writer

Creative nonfiction writer Angela Balcita will be on the Chester College of New England campus workshopping and talking with students. Her public reading will be Thursday, October 25 from 6 PM to 8 PM in Powers 29.

Angela Balcita's essays have recently appeared in The New York Times, The Utne Reader, The Wilson Quarterly, The Iowa Review, and Geez Magazine and have been included in anthologies such as Waking Up American: Coming of Age Biculturally and The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction. She has received awards from Associated Writers and Writing Programs, Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, and the University of Iowa. Her memoir, Moonface, will be published in 2009. She lives in Baltimore.

Compass Rose interviews Angela Balcita

Compass Rose: What do you do when you are creatively stuck?

Angela Balcita: You mean other than re-check my email, clean my house, do a crossword, and take a nap? Well, first, I try to relax. I get nothing done when I'm too stressed out. Then, I go read something I've never read before, like the fiction in this week's New Yorker or whatever is new in some of my favorite literary magazines. I look for something new that I like, and I try to copy what the author is doing. Usually when I'm stealing other authors' work, I get a surge of ideas, and something will come out of it.

CR: Is there a particular place or pen that you use when you write?

Balcita: Because I'm a writer with a day job, I write wherever and whenever I get a chance. Right now, I really like working in coffee shops and libraries. When there are other people working around me, that usually keeps me focused. (more)

23 October - Liz Chalfin
Printmaker

On October 23 at 2:30 pm, printmaker Liz Chalfin will give a public lecture in the conference room of Chester College of New England's Wadleigh Library. Chalfin is a visiting artist, part of the college's Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Professionally, Liz Chalfin is visual artist and art educator. She is founder and director and resident artist of Zea Mays Printmaking in Florence, Massachusetts. Zea Mays Printmaking is a studio/workshop dedicated to research, education and collaborations in safer and non-toxic printmaking. Chalfin teaches workshops at Zea Mays and on the road at colleges and art centers regionally. She is also adjunct faculty in Lesley University’s Creative Arts in Learning graduate program.

Chalfin exhibits her prints, drawings and artist’s books nationally in solo and group exhibitions. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Smith College Museum of Art, and Mortimer Rare Book Room as well as the Portland Museum of Art, the De Cordova Museum and Sculpture Park and the Boston Public Library. She exhibited at the 2005 Boston Printmakers Biennial Exhibition, was included in the Boston Drawing Project at the Bernard Toale Gallery and her print “Men Making Decisions” was featured on the cover of the autumn 2005 edition of the international magazine Printmaking Today.

Chalfin works in etching, monotype, photopolymer, collograph and mixed media printmaking. She creates prints artist’s books. Her imagery explores social, spiritual and psychological issues through the use of symbolism, figuration and abstraction.

Chalfin is a member of the Boston Printmakers, the Monotype Guild of New England and the Southern Graphics Council. She is represented by Susan Maasch Fine Arts, Portland, ME.

Compass Rose interviews Liz Chalfin

Compass Rose: In viewing some of your work I noticed a lot of natural elements such as plants and animals. What influences you to use such subjects and why?

Liz Chalfin: One of the overarching themes I explore through my artwork is the
interconnectedness of life - humans, plants, animals, minerals. Images of these elements occur, usually out of their natural context and integrated or juxtaposed in a new context.

CR: I found the reason behind naming your studio Zea Mays interesting in how you compare the purifying benefits of the sweet corn to the use of non-toxic printmaking methods. What was your drive in creating this non-toxic printmaking studio as opposed to creating a studio for traditional printmaking practices?

Chalfin: First, I am wary of the term "non-toxic". I believe it is often mis-used. I believe that toxicity is a spectrum, and we try to practice printmaking methods that fall on the less toxic end of the spectrum, but there are still so many unknowns about the toxicity of certain materials, and each persons' level of tolerance for certain substances is different, so toxicity is a relative term. ... (more)

In The Margins

On October 27, 9 PM to Midnight, Chester College of New England will be hosting In The Margins, an experimental art event with the intention of bringing together students and professionals of all mediums. The event will feature artists working live, live models, readings, and music.

In The Margins will be held at the Chester Recreation Center, next to the Chester police station adjacent to the college. The event runs from 9 PM to 12 AM.

Call for Visual Art

Compass Rose, a journal of art and literature, seeks visual art submissions for its 2008 issue. While we consider all mediums, we can only print black and white images. Please send 1 to 3 high resolution images on a CD as well as a short bio to:

Compass Rose
Chester College of New England
40 Chester Street, Chester NH 03036
We cannot accept submissions as email attachments.

Artist Amy Baur

16 October - Amy Baur
Mixed Media Artist

On October 16 at 2:30 pm, artist Amy Baur will give a public lecture in the conference room of Chester College of New England's Wadleigh Library. Baur is a visiting artist, part of the college's Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Amy Baur was born in 1959 and grew up in the Midwest. After college, she moved to Alaska and spent nearly ten years there. After graduate school, at the University of Illinois, Champagne, she moved to Michigan. She and her husband
have a 9-year-old son. Amy runs a company, IN PLAIN SIGHT ART, which uses new digital printmaking technology for ceramics and glass.



COMPASS ROSE interviews Amy Baur

Compass Rose: Many of your works use geometric shapes and clean lines combined with the fluidity of nature, where do you find inspiration? 


Amy Baur: From a slight obsession with the horizon line—noting the curvature of the earth and thinking about relationship between balance and imbalance. 


CR: How important is it for your work to be permanent? 


Baur: In my studio work, I'm not at all interested in permanence. In fact, I often work with non-archival materials such as shoe polish, wax and carbon paper and I like to watch how these are malleable with humidity, temperature and time. For the public works, I GREATLY appreciate that we have now come up with a process that makes a photograph impervious to dust, scratches and UV light.

CR: Is there a satisfaction to leaving behind a permanent piece of yourself?

Baur: Once a piece of work leaves my studio, is on view in a gallery or is purchased I let it go. I don't really see it as mine any longer. So I would not say it is "a piece of myself" but yes a good amount of satisfaction occurs that there is something out there that will cause someone to pause, really look and maybe relate to. (more)

Photographer Steven Bliss

9 October - Steven Bliss
Photographer, Print-Maker

On October 9 at 2:30 pm, photographer Steven Bliss will give a public lecture in the conference room of Chester College of New England's Wadleigh Library. Bliss is a visiting artist, part of the college's Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Bliss is a print-maker and photographer who has a variety of interests and eclectic tastes. Images and subject matter drawn from popular culture appear in his photographs and his approach is personal as well as process-driven. In addition to working in the academy as a teacher, Bliss is an active exhibitor of his work and he is represented by Galerie Ruth Sacshe, in Hamburg, Germany and by Red Gallery, in Savannah, GA.

COMPASS ROSE interviews Steven Bliss

Compass Rose: What got you into photography?

Steven Bliss: My Dad making Christmas cards in the darkroom down in the basement.

CR:What was your first camera?

Bliss:I’m sure I used several cameras before, but my first serious camera was a 35mm Argus that I got when I was 14 or 15 years old. (more)