Join us on Saturday, February 1 when admission to Bennington Museum is FREE for everyone from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. Visit all the new exhibitions and possibly interact with some of the student artists who are invited to come in and pick-up their Certificate of Participation in the 2020 Annual Student Art Exhibition.

Featured in the Regional Artists Gallery through May 10 is Gritty Streets to Green Mountains: Paintings by Scot Borofsky.
Scot Borofsky has navigated an artistic journey divided between the Green Mountains of southern Vermont, where he grew up and has lived and worked much of his adult life, and the gritty streets of New York City, where he had a vibrant career as a street artist from the early 1980s into the mid-1990s. In addition to his home bases of Vermont and New York, Borofsky has traveled extensively in Mexico and Central America. His work draws on a deep well of visual precedents and inspiration, from the patterning and pictographic motifs of ancient and indigenous cultures that he has encountered on his travels and the mountainous landscapes of Vermont, Mexico and Central America, to his fellow Street Artists, with whom he worked side-by-side during his year in New York City, as well as the masters of Modernism. This exhibition illustrates the development of Borofsky’s work over the last 40 years, ranging from early spray paintings created in the streets of New York City, looking like modern day ancient ruins, to his more recent paintings created in his Brattleboro studio, which incorporate an evolving language of complexly layered symbols and the gestural language of paint.

Opening in the Works on Paper Gallery is (re)Sounding, on view through May 25.
Artist/musicians and co-curators of this exhibition Angus McCullough, Jake Nussbaum, and Adam Tinkle bring new life to old instruments. Each musical instrument in the Bennington Museum collection has its own unique story, but have remained silent for decades. McCullough, Nussbaum,  and Tinkle work with the museum’s curatorial staff to meet the instruments where they are, using their current state to generate new sounds. The exhibit explores the histories and traditional sounds of the instruments and provides opportunities to hear them brought back to life in new compositions.

Of course the kickoff for 2020 would not be complete without the annual Student Art Show (through March 12) bringing artwork of the region’s elementary, middle and high school students to the Museum in a display ranging from whimsical projects by the young students to more advanced work of older students. Visitors can explore the artistic development of children as they address a particular topic or by age grouping. Ceramic work, paper sculptures, and more complement collage, pastels, and pen and ink drawings. This exhibit runs through March 10 and is on view in the Parmelee and Limric Galleries.

Coming Soon:
March 28 – June 10 – Love, Marriage, and Divorce  The highs and lows of love and heartache, from Victorian wedding gowns to scandalous tales of sexual harassment.

June 27 – November 3 – Robert Frost, “At Present in Vermont”  Frost’s life and work as a poet and farmer in Bennington County, 1920 – 1938.

Bennington Museum is a member of ArtCountry, a consortium of notable art and performance destinations in the scenic northern Berkshires of Massachusetts and southern Green Mountains of Vermont, including The Clark Art Institute, Williams College Museum of Art , Williamstown Theatre Festival (20 minutes away); and MASS MoCA (25minutes away). Visit ArtCountry.org for more information on these five great cultural centers.