EXHIBITIONS
February 2022 – February 2023
Exhibitions February 2021 – February 2022
WHAT: Relentless! Bread and Puppet’s Political Theater, 1963-2022
WHEN: June 23rd thru July 23rd
WHERE: New York State Puppetry Festival in Perry New York presents this exhibit at the Arts Council of Wyoming County, 31 South Main Street, Perry NY 14530.
More information at https://www.newyorkstatepuppetfestival.org/events
What: “Ecstatic Decrepitude”
This installation of masks, puppets, books, paper maché relief work, and paintings conveys Schumann’s deep commitment to the creative and political work which unites artists and communities in celebration and protest. Schumann says: “Ecstatic Decrepitude is presented on two floors. Bulky, big, oppressed and oppressive decrepitude obviously belongs upstairs, way above ecstasy, which hides in book pages and requires diligent reading on the 1st floor. The faces, idols, agitators and sufferers of the Naked Humanity Republic get entertained by Father Time who strikes the clock for them relentlessly…”
When: April 30th-July 31st
Where: Artyard in Frenchtown, NJ
**Bread and Puppet Press Outpost: Posters, prints postcards, books, calendars and Cheap Art sold here**
Ecstatic Decrepitude Photo Gallery
Contact/ Curator
Clare Dolan: [email protected]
To learn more about Artyard click here.
B&P Artwork at Flat Iron Co Op
What: Exhibit
When: Current – Ongoing
Where: Flat Iron Co Op
51 Square, Bellows Falls, VT 05101
Contact:
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Alexis Smith, Curatrix: [email protected]
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Bread & Puppet: [email protected]
**Link to article by the Brattleboro Reformer “Bread and Puppet art hits close to home”
https://www.reformer.com/arts_and_culture/bread-and-puppet-art-hits-close-to-home/article_d185b9a4-5c41-11ec-995b-1f02a5f9866f.html
Bread and Puppet Featured in the Festival de Casteliers
“Marionettes en Vitrines”
What: Walkabout Exhibit in Outremont Shop Windows ( Canada)
When: February 7 to March 6, 2022
Where: Exhibitions are set up in the following 30 Business!
**Click Here to Watch Virtual Tour**
Maison internationale des arts de la marionnette (MIAM) · Théâtre Outremont · Bibliothèque Robert-Bourassa · Caisse Desjardins des Versants du mont Royal · Yannick Fromagerie · Mission Santé · Boutique Citrouille · Iris · Quincaillerie Home Hardware · La boutique du fleuriste · Librairie du square · Restaurant Thammada · Restaurant Doan · De bons petits plats · Caffè de la Pace · Avis Budget Group · Coiffure Organza · Fleuriste Gala · Lescurier · Nettoyeur vert et Centre de couture Van Horne · Boutique Tout Terrain · Ilion · Ongles GG · Mince Alors · Nettoyeur Outremont · Friperie Morgan · Coiffure Alicia · Dépanneur Van Horne · Cycles Régis
Click Here For Map of the Various Exhibits
***The Marionnettes en vitrines! walkabout exhibit was presented by the REALTA real estate agency as part of the 17th edition of Festival de Casteliers
Exhibit runs July 1 through August 31. Gallery hours: open daily, 8:00 am-8:00 pm. Free and open to all, with a selection of Bread & Puppet’s celebrated “cheap art” posters available for sale on-site. Co-hosted by Midway Gallery and ARTSPEECH. Midway Gallery, 15 Channel Center St., Boston, MA 02210. Contact information: [email protected], 857-250-1356; information and updates available at midwaygallery.org and artspeech.org.
About The Exhibit: During this covid-era “pause”, the Vermont-based Bread & Puppet Theater was gifted a large pile of king-sized bedsheets, discarded by a hotel. Renowned visual and performing artist Peter Schumann, the political puppet theater’s founder and artistic director, immediately seized upon this as an opportunity. Not only to paint a scene per day, on a dumped clean slate canvas. But also to take this on as a daily exercise, of freely slapping paint around while grappling with all the issues that have made the world a sh*tty mess.
Like hanging out to dry in a mighty stiff wind, Schumann’s “Bedsheet Mitigations” series, a portion of which will be on display in Fort Point’s Midway Gallery, never really sits still for any viewer. His iconic visual approach, no matter if they are part of a performance or let to lay flat, are hardly ever created by Schumann for relaxed observation only.
The selections from Schumann’s “Bedsheet Mitigations” series, specifically chosen for this exhibit at Midway, were first revealed at Bread & Puppet’s “Insurrection – Lamentation — Resurrection Service” performances, held up in VT during their socially distant contact-traced 2020-2021 season. Combined with these “mitigation” images will be several other bedsheet pieces on display at Midway, gleaned from Schumann’s new “Crucifixion” series, which he started generating in earnest this past February-March.
Never one to mince words, Schumann’s mission statement, specifically addressing this exhibit in Fort Point, acknowledges the precarious position that the neighborhood’s dwindling artists’ community faces, in spite of the ironic fact that this particular Boston neighborhood, now dwarfed by pristine condition high-rise glass and steel, had once been declared “historic” in 2009 by the then mayor.
Peter Schumann’s Artist Mission Statement (May 2021):
1) “I am not a professional painter because professional painters either make or hope to make their living from painting. I am a cheap artist which means: if I sell I also want to ridicule the for-sale system of art.”;
2) “Bad bedsheet research. Dumpster-retrieved bedsheets contain quantities of secret life, sweet dreams and nightmares of anonymous sleepers’ lives in relation to their history and planet.”;
3) “Dirty painful reality doesn’t allow these paintings to be abstract and enjoy abstinence from that dirt and pain. This is sloganeering art, propaganda against the lousy capitalist system that feeds and tortures us.”
About Midway Gallery and ARTSPEECH:
The Midway Gallery is located on the first floor of the Midway Artist Studios, an 89 unit building comprised of live-work artist studios, located in the Fort Point section of Boston. Established in 2005 as Boston’s largest affordable live-work artist building, Midway continues to be a place for artists to live and work affordably, in spite of the real estate boom, which has swept through Fort Point, displacing hundreds of working artists. In 2014, the resident artists organized to purchase the building, making it a permanent rental and artist controlled building, run by a board of directors, elected in part by the artist residents themselves. Midway Artist Studios is the only remaining artist rental building in Fort Point. The Midway Gallery’s current co-chair and co-curator is visual and performance artist Milan Kohout, the Midway’s first resident artist, who continues to live and work in the building.
ARTSPEECH, an artists’ collective dedicated to promoting freedom of artistic speech, was formed in June 2020 specifically in response to the strong differences of opinion surrounding the rights of freedom of expression within the art world. The founding and current members of ARTSPEECH can be found at artspeech.org/members/. The backstory that prompted its founding can be found at artspeech.org/press-release/.
Peter Schumann to Exhibit Original Work at
Rabble-Rouser Chocolate & Craft Co. through Fall 2023.
MONTPELIER, VT – Rabble-Rouser Chocolate & Craft Co. is hosting a new art exhibit in its downtown Montpelier café and event space through Summer 2021. Entitled The In and Out Show, “Off We Go” riding through “The All” with Bedsheet Mitigations, this exhibit features paintings done on discarded king-sized bedsheets by octogenarian cultural icon, Peter Schumann of Bread & Puppet Theater, hung in and out of Rabble-Rouser.
The exhibit extends from inside the Rabble-Rouser factory and windows out into the giant black brick outside wall adjacent to the alley. A wide selection of posters and publications from Bread & Puppet Press/Cheap Art are available for sale in the Rabble-Rouser cafe during the exhibit. In addition to visual art, the gallery includes a piano that is open for passers-by to play.
The paintings featured in this exhibit were all created during the COVID-19 pandemic, and some were featured in Bread & Puppet’s Insurrection – Lamentation – Resurrection Service performances of 2020-21. This exhibit of The Bedsheet Mitigations is dedicated to the memory of Bread & Puppet collaborator Penelope T. Gregory, “Poppy,” (1929-2012). She organized for Bread and Puppet and produced shows in the Boston area, hosting the theater innumerable times, feeding the puppeteers her famous dolmas and spanakopita. A grandmother to B&P community, a generous and upbeat woman, Poppy is being honored because of her lifetime support of justice and peace. When asked for comment on the dedication, Schumann said “the divine spanakopita Poppy of the sacred heart singing glory.”
Art is an ancient coping mechanism for oppression, inequality and boredom–all the conditions of 2020. People’s creative impulses have exploded the whole world over as a result of the intense solitude experienced by all of humanity, all at once. At the same time, public institutions, including theatre’s and museums, are shuttering–whether temporarily or permanently–and formerly immersive cultural experiences are being relegated to the small corners of our lives. The new Rabble-Rouser art gallery represents a “third place”– a place where people can go besides their homes and workplaces, if only briefly, to experience beauty and briefly escape the mundanity of the times.
“History shows us that when times are tough, people make art to help their spirit survive,” says Rabble-Rouser rising-owner and shopkeeper, Maia Castonguay. “In turn, this art lifts the spirits of the community. Our customers often just come in for a macchiato and are thrilled to stumble upon this art gallery – it’s been a bright spot for them in the middle of this dreary pandemic.”
As a result of social distancing measures (Rabble-Rouser is currently operating at 30-50% capacity) and through the leveraging of state and national COVID-19 relief funding, the chocolate factory was able to dedicate 1,200 square feet of their downtown Montpelier space to this free community art gallery. The ingenuity at 64 Main Street is an example to other business owners of how to think in new, radically generous ways about their resources and communities, and to engender cultural growth where there would otherwise be shuttered windows and taped-off spaces.
Rabble-Rouser has already curated multiple exhibits in the space, featuring the work of local artists Ryan Geary, MytheBe, Natasha Bogar, and Nicholas Hecht of the Pyralisk Theatre. Upcoming events include a book release and visual art exhibit from Eleanor Ott in April, and a 75th birthday show from Diane Kaganova that will launch on Mayday. They are hopeful that Schumann will be able enact a live event outside the chocolate factory later this spring, and that their gallery will evolve as an outpost for theater and Cheap Art Press over the long term.
About Rabble-Rouser
Rabble-Rouser Chocolate & Craft Company is a Vermont-based, 100% worker-owned cooperative creating the highest quality chocolate confections and granola. They produce a variety of handcrafted delights from their headquarters in Montpelier, Vermont, including gourmet chocolate bars, truffles, toffee, granola, Magic Chunks – chocolate covered granola clusters – and CBD chocolate confections. They are two-time winners of the Good Food Awards, for their Dulcey Salted Caramel Bar (in 2014) and their Dulcey Truffle (2021).
Formerly known as Nutty Steph’s, Rabble-Rouser strives to strengthen, nourish, and support their community through the unifying power of exceptional chocolate, art, craft, and culture. With an emphasis on high-quality, local and ethically sourced ingredients, Rabble-Rouser’s confections serve as a delicious way to pursue their mission of tasteful social change.
Rabble-Rouser products are sold in their downtown Montpelier, Vermont café and store, as well as co-ops and independent grocery stores around the region. To order online, and to learn more about Rabble-Rouser’s vision of building a better status quo, please visit rabblerouser.net.
A Bugs World at The Highland Center for the Arts, Greensboro, Vt – Summer 2021
The Highland Center for the Arts will be featuring the work of Peter Schumann along their Open Air Gallery. Works will include recent paintings in his ongoing Bedsheet series. This will certainly be a unique way to experience this work. More to come soon.
