IN THE GALLERIES: Coloring Outside the Lines

Written by

Alison McGee

Out of the Box exhibit at the North Adams Artists' Co-Operative Gallery

In their fall exhibit, Out of the Box, members of the North Adams Artists’ Co-Operative Gallery (NAACO) leap beyond their comfort zones with works that are atypical in medium, subject matter, or process. The thirty-five-member co-op opened in North Adams, Massachusetts, in June, and visitors now familiar with the artists’ works and styles will enjoy these fresh twists.

Normally representational, artist Ed Carson played with abstraction in his acrylic painting Rabbit; Katherine Borkowski-Byrne, whose work is typically abstract and less explicit in reference to subject matter, has created just the opposite in Ocean, her realistic, subtly colored painting of the sea. Textile designer Martha Flood, who usually draws from nature, strayed from her organic inspirations to create a modern, geometric textile pattern.

Leading by example, the artists at the NAACO Gallery invite visitors to embrace and explore innovation, showing that beauty and talent can radiate from the unfamiliar. [OCTOBER 2009]