Culture

“We Need to Re-Connect with Nature!”

“I’m ‘wired’ for visionary thinking — though I’m good at mathematics and abstract ideas, I have enough deep compassion to speak out and say, ‘this is not working; we’re out of touch with ancient and deeply spiritual ideas’.

“So I’m a ‘doc’, helping sick people get better, but I’m also a teacher, reminding people of forgotten and misunderstood history, practices, wisdom, and lore.” 

Wayne P. London M.D., whose oil portrait by Brattleboro artist William H. Hays (at right) will be displayed in the front window of the new Angel Boy Gallery, next to Shin La Restaurant, during the month of May, 2015 and as part of the Friday,  May 1 Gallery Walk.

William H. Hay’s ‘Local Portrait Series’ will be honored and recognized in the front window of the new Angel Boy Gallery, located next to Shin La Restaurant, for a month beginning this Friday. The exhibit will include a few of the actual portraits!

“I Discovered I Could Express A Person’s Essence!” — William H. Hays

“In the early 2000s, I was in an artist’s ‘dry spell’ similar to a writer’s block. Friends counseled me that I ought to try a different approach. I thought about it, then I took a trip overseas to relax and await new inspiration. So I happened to be at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and saw a Rembrandt; a portrait of an old woman. I was surprised to discover that because of the qualities of the portrait, I knew who she was! Then I immediately had the thought:

”I can do that!” — William H. Hays

by Tom Fels
 
Establishing an independent artistic personality is a key challenge for most photographers, even more so when their name already conjures up one of the best known figures in the field. For photographers in the second half of the twentieth century, the work of Diane Arbus brought a sea change, the arrival of a significant personal vision which has been characterized as rendering strange the familiar and uncovering the familiar in the strange. Most conversant with the art of the past few decades would recognize her work.
 
For her daughter Amy the first solution was to stay away. She didn’t take up photography seriously until her early twenties. From that point on, however, she has been determined to blaze a path of her own. Today, decades later, we can see where her efforts have taken her.

I am proposing a multi-disciplinary arts and cultural festival to take place annually in and around Brattleboro during the ‘fall foliage’ season. In practical terms this will mean from the beginning of September through the week following Columbus Day.

Here are some thoughts about the Festival which I have recently put into writing. Please note that one of the functions of the festival is to focus extraordinary funding for the arts into that season or window of time.                                            [Photograph by William Hays]

I am seeking individuals who may be interested in serving on the founding Board of Fantastic Wantastiquet. This will be a non-profit organization, will seek funding through grants and charitable donations, and will distribute grants whose arts & cultural work projects contribute to the local economy and to the themes and purposes of the Festival.

With Brattleboro artist William Hays ending 25 years’ presence in the downtown on Main Street, several of us have gotten together to try to honor his contributions to our community’s cultural life. Accordingly, we are seeking places to display portraits by Hays which are part of his Brattleboro community portrait series.

We’ll anchor these Hays retrospective displays with a front-window feature of two of his best-known portraits, those of ‘Nina’ (NIna Singleton-Spencer, now the bass player for The Snaz), and of Wayne London, the iconoclastic psychiatrist / metaphysician who is founder of the Brattleboro M.A.S.H. Unit (Metaphysical and Spiritual Healing).