Greetings!

This week we're presenting Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Concord Art and Southern Vermont Art Center.

This week's collection of three group exhibitions promises wide-ranging works in a diverse array of mediums from literally hundreds of artists. While artists were given free-reign for two expansive group exhibitions, one group show focuses on a different expanse - the sky.

The September/October 2026 edition of Artscope Magazine is now available at a gallery, museum or arts organization near you!

Planning to attend Art Basel Paris? Visit us at the fair's Magazine Sector from October 23-25 at the Grand Palais.

The deadline to advertise in the November/December 2026 edition of Artscope Magazine is Thursday, Oct. 15.

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-Sawyer Smook-Pollitt

// IN THIS BLAST //

Sponsored By: Art Basel Paris, Bromfield Gallery, Attleboro Arts Museum, Copley Society of Art, Cape Ann Plein Air, Boston Antiquarian Book Fair, James Library and Center for the Arts, Addison Gallery of American Art, The Boston Printmakers, Lexington Arts and Crafts Society, and Artscope Online.

Center for Maine Contemporary Art presents Because the Sky is Blue, a group exhibition featuring the work of 11 artists who responded to a deceptively simple theme, "Because the Sky is Blue."

But according to curator Grant Wahlquist, this is a show "of paintings that do many things at once." While many of the pieces in this exhibition are monochromes, upon closer inspection they "may tell you they are also many other things: skyscapes, windows, screens." Other works are closer to photorealism or trompe l’œil. Also featured are "sculptures, prints, collages, and a film that trespass on painting, that may in fact be paintings when viewed from the right perspective."

Artists utilized experiences of "displacement, loss, tragedy, war, oppression, death, and all manner of catastrophes" to create their work. Artworks also "grew from love, wonder, and everyday moments of beauty and tenderness," according to Wahlquist. The exhibition, at its core, allows artists and viewers to reflect on the sky itself: "Omnipresent, unremarkable, potent, sublime, divine, and occasionally frightening."

Through October, the gallery is open Monday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 12 to 5 p.m. From November through May, the gallery is open Wednesday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sunday from 12 to 5 p.m. Center for Maine Contemporary Art is located at 21 Winter St., Rockland, ME. For more information, please visit here.

Concord Art presents the 27th Annual Frances N. Roddy Exhibition, a long-running group exhibition dedicated to the memory of "long-standing friend and artist member of the art association, Frances Roddy, whose family and friends endowed a prize to be given annually in her name to the best entry in this all media show," according to Concord Art.

"Frances truly loved the Concord Art Association. In particular, she cherished the friendships she made with fellow artists through the many classes and exhibits in which she participated," wrote Frances's son, Gibbs Roddy. "She was very proud of being one of the Association’s distinguished artists. In short, Frances found the people and dynamism of the Art Association invigorating. Concord Art was a central, and wonderful, aspect of her life in Concord.”

This exhibition, juried by Worcester Art Museum Curator of Contemporary Art Samantha Cataldo, includes over 125 pieces by the same number of artists working in a wide variety of mediums.

The gallery is open Tuesday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and Sunday from 12 to 4 p.m. Concord Art is located at 37 Lexington Rd., Concord, MA. For more information, please visit here.

Southern Vermont Arts Center presents 97th Annual Open Members’ Exhibition, which brings together over 200 artists in "an expansive snapshot of the artists and creative practices that make up the SVAC community today," according to a press release.

Not a juried exhibition, this show is "intentionally broad: an abundant, salon-like presentation shaped by many individual voices rather than a single curatorial aesthetic." The exhibition includes painting, photography, works on paper, sculpture, ceramics, fiber, craft,mixed media, and other approaches.

While there was no mandatory prompt to which artists had to respond, an optional theme of "A Handcrafted Utopia" invited "participating artists to consider handwork, skilled making, material knowledge, and the value of objects made with care." All pieces in the show are for sale as well, "with the exhibition encouraging the idea that collecting can begin simply: with a work that makes someone stop,look again, and want to keep living with it."

There will be an Open Members' Exhibition Party on Saturday, Oct. 10 from 3 to 5 p.m. Immediately preceding the party on October 10 will be "Art Talk: Craft in Context: Life and Art in the Handcrafted Utopia," from 2 to 3 p.m. The talk will examine Arts and Crafts communities, considering how craft, communal living, artistic production, and social ideals came together in these experiments in intentional community. The gallery is open Wednesday to Sunday from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Southern Vermont Arts Center is located at 860 SVAC Dr. / West Rd., Manchester, VT. For more information, please visit here.

Sponsored By: Art Basel Paris, Bromfield Gallery, Attleboro Arts Museum, Copley Society of Art, Cape Ann Plein Air, Boston Antiquarian Book Fair, James Library and Center for the Arts, Addison Gallery of American Art, The Boston Printmakers, Lexington Arts and Crafts Society, and Artscope Online.

Artscope Online

Check out Artscope Online for the latest posts and updates, as well as the Artscope social feed to see what's happening today.

As always, information on upcoming exhibits and performing arts events can be sent to pr@artscopemagazine.com, to appear in the magazine or in e-blasts such as this. Want to advertise? Reach us here for more information. To learn more about sponsoring these email blasts, contact us at advertise@artscopemagazine.com or call (617) 639-5771.

Sawyer Smook-Pollitt

Artscope email blast! editor

email: pr@artscopemagazine.com

phone: 617-639-5771

web: artscopemagazine.com