The 87th Regional Exhibition of Art & Craft  
Now extended

September 9 through 17, 2023

 The 87th Regional Exhibition of Art & Craft is one of the longest-running juried exhibitions in New England. This annual show at the Fitchburg Art Museum spotlights the artists and crafters of our region by providing a museum environment for their work and connecting them with fellow creators, patrons, and art enthusiasts. Please join us in celebrating the vitality and importance of our immediate artist community!

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Andrius Alvarez-Backus: Desastre!
Now extended

September 9 through 17, 2023

Lancaster artist Andrius Alvarez-Backus employs a collage aesthetic that brings together a wide variety of materials: fabric, paint, pastels, wood, wax, feathers, grass, raffia, sand, stones, and found objects. These juxtaposed and aesthetically altered things work in concert with evocative colors, abstract images, and precarious compositions to elicit a sense of uncertainty, instability, and possible disaster. The artist’s work has been deeply informed by images and objects from his Filipino heritage that bear the weight of centuries of colonialism.

Andrius Alvarez-Backus was the First Prize winner in last summer’s 86th Regional Exhibition of Art & Craft at FAM.

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La bodega de mis sueños (The bodega of my dreams)  
 Also on view

In this inaugural installation of public art on the museum’s façade, Cuban-American artist and educator Gabriel Sosa considers the stories of Spanish-speaking residents in Central Massachusetts, contemporary visual culture in downtown Fitchburg, and the complexities of the American Dream.

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Ari Montford’s Freedom Arrows
Also on view

Ari Montford’s Freedom Arrows amplifies the arrow’s symbolism as tool, weapon, and message to explore Indigenous Black themes through the lens of the Native American experience of genocide. Within the museum lobby, a volley of hand-beaded arrows is suspended midair (as if just unleashed from unseen bows) and embedded in the walls. Dual concepts of protection and service, aggression and power blend with the arrows’ spiritual presence to create a space that provokes conversation about racial justice and narrative-making. Montford’s installation engages with the impact of structural racism, Indigenous trauma, and the process of creating safe spaces for restorative justice through their own voice as a Black Two Spirit Indigenous cultural practitioner.

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In the Eye of the Beholder: Gender through the Camera Lens
Now through October 1, 2023

In the Eye of the Beholder delves into the Fitchburg Art Museum’s permanent collection to explore how photographers have used the “gendered gaze” across the 20th and early 21st centuries. This exhibition highlights some of the museum’s iconic favorites and recent acquisitions—including work from Sir Zanele Muholi, Cindy Sherman, and Yasumasa Morimura—to examine how power is embedded in the male and female gazes. In the Eye of the Beholder further explores artists who experiment with or outright reject the gender binary, questioning and complicating methods of perceiving gender and its performance.

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Community Gallery

The Highlands Garden Terrace Community: Expressions
September 9–October 1, 2023

Expressions is a celebration of the ways creative arts can serve as a means of communication for individuals living with dementia. This exhibition features a variety of expressive art forms that allow an individual living with dementia to make connections to their identity and environment. In creating these works of art, residents show they have lived a life

full of experiences and continue to have

more to give and share to those

willing to look and listen.

The Community Gallery is supported by a generous gift from Dr. Roderick and Donna Lewin

Rania Matar: Oceans at My Door
Now through January 7, 2024

The Fitchburg Art Museum is thrilled to present an exhibition celebrating its recent acquisition of Rania Matar’s stunning portfolio SHE. Matar is a Lebanese-American photographer internationally renowned for her explorations of cross-cultural identity and femininity. The arresting, intimate portraits in SHE evoke the transitional states of Becoming, what Matar describes as “the fraught beauty and vulnerability of growing up” as a young woman. This portfolio is shown alongside other works from Matar’s subsequent series Where Do I Go?, an ongoing project that focuses on Lebanese women at a crossroad as they navigate national crises of corruption, inflation, lockdown, and shortages.

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Programs

Yoga in the Galleries
Tuesday, September 19, 2023 - 6:15-7:30 pm

Experience the combination of going inside to see the beauty within and coming into the gallery to see the beauty around you. Join the practice of yoga with Dianne Tousignant where you are guided through breath awareness, warm-up poses, strengthening, and relaxation. Beginners are welcome. Instruction can be adapted for new students as well as those with more experience.

$15 drop-in per class payable in class. Fall session multi-class discount: register for 13 classes $169, FAM members discount: $143. If you prefer to register in advance call 978-345-4207 or email [email protected]

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Hidden Treasures
Thursday, September 21 , 1:00 - 3:00 PM

Hidden Treasures is a specialized art appreciation program for individuals with early to middle stage Alzheimer’s disease or a related dementia and their caregivers. Programs are limited to 16 participants and require a caregiver with each individual adult with Alzheimer’s and professional staff with a group. Hidden Treasures is free, and participants must pre-register with the Fitchburg Art Museum by calling 978-345-4207 or by emailing [email protected]

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JuntArte: A Community Art Celebration
Saturday, September 30, 2023,2:00-5:00 PM

Join us to celebrate the Fitchburg Public Schools artists who designed this year’s Lionel Reinford Community Art Project, and their mentor Gabriel Sosa, the creator of FAM’s newest outdoor art installation, La bodega de mis sueños. There will be music, food, art-making and a walking tour of the public art with Sosa and the young artists. This free program is also the launch of FAM’s new Spanish-language programming series coming soon. These projects are generously sponsored by The Lionel Reinford Arts Enrichment Fund, The Cathedral Fund, and Local Roots, Fitchburg and developed in partnership with the Fitchburg Public Schools, InTown Fitchburg, and Prime Real Estate Investment LLC.

Fitchburg Open Studios
September 30– October 1, 2023 ,11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Fitchburg Open Studios is a free, self-guided, art discovery tour. This tour, allows you to visit with as many artists and locations as you desire, with each stop offering its own unique and varied experience. During this event, Fitchburg Art Museum will be hosting two artists in the Art Place on Elm.

Fitchburg Open Studios is a program of the Fitchburg Cultural Alliance

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