How does a museum filled with materials from days gone by stay vital in a world where Internet connections span the globe, information sought is instantly found via a search engine, and historical relics can be viewed in 3-D on a digital screen?
That question is just one of many that challenge 21stcentury museum boards. Thankfully for the Southcoast there exists a place whose size belies its expanding vitality – the Mattapoisett Museum. Located at the corner of Baptist and Church Streets, the museum has been the home to a vast collection of historical memorabilia for decades. Under the leadership of Director Dr. Jeff Miller, President Jennifer McIntire, the board of directors, and an exhibit committee focused on keeping the museum as a center of learning and human expression, the museum is fast becoming a true cultural center.
The Summer 2019 exhibit titled “Inspiration: Time & Texture” has achieved new heights in bridging history to art. The exhibit is the brainchild of the exhibit committee and builds off the success the organization has earned with guest speakers, educational presentations, and concerts over the last two years.
McIntire explained that the genesis of the exhibit’s theme came from the exhibit committee.
“They brainstormed and then presented ideas to the board of directors,” she said. “They thought the traction built off talks by artists that we held here made sense.”
McIntire took no credit for the idea itself, but she did become the point person for inviting artists. Twelve artists accepted the challenge. They were to create a work of art inspired by something in the museum collections.
Katherine Staelin, who hails from Harlem but has local ties, presented a three-part installation titled “With?” The work employs three creative avenues to tell her story – a painting on linen, digital graphics, and teacups positioned by a teapot from the museum.
“The objects are positioned as if at a tea party, but the owners aren’t there any longer,” said Staelin.
Retired police officer Anthony Days has always enjoyed the arts. His own capabilities and interest began at a young age and were fostered by the art instructors in the local schools who saw his talent. Today he is becoming a renaissance man with his own space in the Hatch Studios building in New Bedford.
Days’ inspiration for his painting of the stone bridge across River Road was an old black and white photograph of the iconic bridge, a bridge he has seen all his life and of which he never tires. He said that he hoped preservation of the bridge was a high priority for the town.
“It’s near and dear to my heart,” he said.
Days used water-based oil paints to get rich color and movement.
Hoyt Hottel’s fire scene is a dense acrylic on canvas painting, rather petite in size, but it makes up for that in thickly applied vibrant color. The scene of a fire leaves the observer to make their own decisions about what is happening while inspired by antique fire equipment in the museum collection. Hottel holds a B.A. in graphic design and works in a variety of mediums and techniques.
Dick Morgado’s oil on canvas of the E.A. Walsh General Store asks the viewer to remember Mattapoisett at a time when the general store was the hub of the community. He says he keeps returning to the 1950s and ‘60s when he was a boy in town. Morgado holds a B.A. in fine arts and a masters in education. Now retired, he is enjoying painting and writing for his personal entertainment. This version of the general store shares with the observer Morgado’s childhood Mattapoisett, “… when life was simple and real life was someplace else.”
Kent McCormack’s photograph titled “A Night At The Museum” is the photographer’s use of the medium to “freeze moments in time.” He has been a photographer for over 30 years capturing the ordinary and the extraordinary. His creativity runs the gambit, as McCormack is also a chef.
“Evaporation”, a series of three prints by Anna Van Voorhis, was inspired by the saltworks industry that once thrived along the shores of Mattapoisett. The blue tones represent the ocean waters used to extract the salt crystals. Van Voorhis grew up in town and later earned an M.F.A. in sculpture and ceramics from the University of Minnesota.
And what would a New England museum be without a whale? Ryan McFee’s black whale is a tour de force, a large wooden sculpture that glows with back lighting – a piece he described as both “realism and surrealism.”
It is fitting that Peter Michael Martin’s piece, “Prevailing Southwesterly”, a white line woodcut, is hung below the nautical map made by Clifford Ashley, the inspiration for Martin’s submission. Martin, a well-known local educator and artist, is currently enjoying rave reviews of his installation work titled “Moby Dick” at the Cape Cod Museum of Art in Dennis. Martin’s theme of souls struggling against all odds and against the might and savagery of the seas is handled with precision and control.
St. George Tucker Aufranc’s “Dream of the Artic Circle” in teak is a clean form with a complex meaning. The work hangs high on the wall where its full scale can be most appreciated. It was inspired by local whaling ships built in Mattapoisett and sailed over to the Artic. This piece of wooden sculpture is his homage to the brave sailors who made those trips.
Photography was the medium used by Peter Mello to share his deep love and concern for our children and the impact of global warming. The photographs of his daughter, Joy, and her friends include the children’s answers to issues likely to be significant to their lives in 2100. The answers are as haunting as they are insightful. Mello has studied photography at Connecticut College.
A large work from the hand of artist Joanne Mogilnicki, titled “Cogs and Gears”, is an impressive acrylic on watercolor paper. She used 19thcentury machine and handmade tooling native to Mattapoisett’s earliest industries as her inspiration. It is, as she described it, a work that blends ingenuity, art, and engineering as “lodestars” for progress and innovation. Mogilnicki is a faculty member at Old Rochester Regional High School.
The wooden wall sculpture by John Middleton titled “Tidal Clocks” repeats a box-like pattern with changing color themes like weathered wood or driftwood that gives each of the four square pieces their own personality while rhythmically maintaining the structural integrity. The work is reminiscent of wooden boxes from local sawmills, an industry that once flourished in Mattapoisett.
And last, but not least, standing in the carriage house of the museum complex is a tall tower crafted from cardboard, paper, and crayon created by Center School third-graders depicting the clock tower at Mattapoisett’s Center School.
Inspiration: Time & Texture will be open throughout July. Visit www.mattapoisettmuseum.org for days and time.
By Marilou Newell