artSPACE@16
And Owner SAND T:
BUILDING A VIBRANT ARTS
COMMUNITY IN MALDEN
BY CELENA CARR
ARTICLE
COURTESY OF THE MIDDLESEX BEAT ARTS MAGAZINE
November 2005 / Page 5
Take a few turns away from Malden center, make your way through the neighborhoods and winding roads, and you will find yourself at number 16 Princeton Rd. Pull into the driveway and you will notice something unusual when you enter the two car garage. There are no cars. The floors are a freshly painted grey, the ceiling has been removed, exposing the wooden rafters, the walls are a crisp white and have been partitioned to create different sections, and most unusual of all, there is art hanging from these walls. You have found artSPACE@16, an art oasis tucked just outside of Boston, owned and solely operated by Sand T, artist, art enthusiast, and activist.
artSPACE@16 is not the first gallery for Sand T, who in 1998 founded the ST Gallery in the Fort Point artists' community, from which she and other artists were evicted a year and a half later due to construction of a nine-story parking garage. Rather than giving into her discouragement over this turn of events, Sand T moved to Malden in 2000 and took an unusual control over irony, transforming her own detached two-car garage into the gallery now known as artSPACE@16.
She says, "The change in location had changed the physical space of my gallery but didn't change my mission. This major set back had turned into a cause, a positive motivation to continue doing what I have passion and skill for." She chose Malden "because of its accessible location - it takes 15 minutes to travel from downtown Boston to Malden. I felt that 16 Princeton Rd was a great place… I saw there was a potential that I could make a difference here."
If making a difference is her primary goal, she has certainly achieved it. She has collaborated with the city for almost four years to develop an arts community in Malden, which to her means creating living and working space for artists (a goal which has been realized in two new gallery-studios in Malden, IDEAS 5 and SOHO Art Center). But her main aim remains increasing art's accessibility to the community through galleries like her own artSPACE@16 and the new Mayor's Gallery, an idea she approached the Mayor about in 2003, and which now hosts ongoing exhibitions featuring local artists. Her ultimate goal is "to bring artSPACE@16 to its next level by relocating to a larger location in downtown Malden [and] expand its programming to eight events per year including installation of multimedia events and one-day events… [and] to put Malden Art on the map."
The current artSPACE@16 is dedicated to showcasing the work of mostly local artists, though works by national and international artists also appear in the exhibits. At the recent exhibit COLOR BY DIGITAL, which Sand T describes as "a digital photography exhibit juried by Toru Nakanishi featuring 31 artists who explore and/or abuse the possibility of inkjet printing technology." The result was a well-balanced mix of techniques and styles including straight shots, scanned images, photographs manipulated with technologies such as Adobe Photoshop, as well as collage pieces.
And though the space is small, it somehow housed 53 works by 31 artists, each with a different take on the theme of digital inkjet printing, without seeming cluttered or overdone. Juror Toru Nakanishi displayed both classic prints of black and white photographs as well as more experimental prints of scanned images (you may remember his work from the recent DeCordova exhibit); Cristina Pujol presented sharp black and white prints; and Monique Cousineau showed Blue Hair, a wonderfully composed playful portrait of a girl whose face is tipped serenely upward, the softness of her bright blue hair and milky skin offset by the sharpness of piercings, a collar, and the shots of bright color surrounding her.
The next slated exhibit, LOVE SMALL - SMALL WORKS will "offer an opportunity to see in one single location hundreds of artworks including experimental and traditional work in small format in various media such as: artist books, paintings, drawings, printmaking, photographs, sculptures, fabric work and mixed media works." It will run on prescheduled Saturdays from October 22 to November 19 (all other times by appointment), and there will be a reception on October 29 from 12-5 pm, including a Gallery talk with juror Adria Arch and participating artists beginning at 3 p.m.
The best quality of artSPACE@16 is its accessibility, not only in its location, but also in its spirit. There is a level of comfort and ease that other galleries and contemporary museums do not achieve. Sand T's warm, welcoming personality adds to this feeling as she chats with the patrons and artists who stop in, inviting all to take part in her vision of an arts community where artists and appreciators can come together "to take part in building a vibrant artists' community."
For more information on current and upcoming exhibits, archives of past exhibits, driving directions, and links to other happenings in the Malden arts community visit www.artSPACEat16.com., or call 781.321.8058 voicemail *3.
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ARTICLE COURTESY OF THE MIDDLESEX
BEAT ARTS MAGAZINE / NOV 2005 / PG 5
IMAGES COURTESY OF AE ASHLEY, JAMES ZALL, MICHEAL CIRELLI and
MARY O'MALLEY / BACKGROUND IMAGE
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