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FAWC News Archive: Fall/Winter 1998 -'99 Summer 1998: A Season of Accomplishments
The Hudson D. Walker Gallery offered an exciting season of exhibitions. Kicking off the July 4th weekend was a show of never-before-seen drawings by Myron Stout, owned by the late Reggie Cabral, a member of the Board of Trustees. The show contained 22 pencil drawings, and its importance was highlighted by a major review in the Sunday New York Times which brought people from across the country to view the exhibition. As July progressed, the Work Center was proud to host the Long Point Gallery which recently lost its exhibition space in Provincetown. Given the uncertainty of the cooperative gallery's future, the Work Center show may be the last for this group of well-respected Provincetown artists. The Long Point show was followed by a stunning exhibition of black and white photographs of poets by Ted Rosenberg. The opening of the Rosenberg show featured readings by poets Gail Mazur and Gerald Stern. Following the Rosenberg exhibition, the 22nd Annual Auction Preview stirred anticipation for the weekend event. An exciting show featuring new work by Ohio State Arts Council Visual Fellow Laura Lisbon followed. Labor Day weekend brought the opening of the James Hansen Show, which featured works donated by artists to raise money to name a studio in his memory at the Work Center (see story on page 4). The summer exhibition season concluded with a show by the Outer Cape Artists in Residence Consortium, featuring work by artists who had stayed in dune shacks. Throughout the season, the Work Center somehow found time to host other activities as well. In July, a concert by Ricky Ian Gordon was held at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum, featuring poems by Summer Faculty members Marie Howe, Michael Klein and others, set to music. This benefit event brought in support for both PAAM and FAWC. A Saturday night slide presentation by the editors of Improper Bostonians-200 years of Gay and Lesbian History in Massachusetts filled the Stanley Kunitz Common Room. In August, the Work Center hosted Robert Pinsky's Favorite Poem Project which invited an eclectic cross-section of Provincetown residents to read their favorite piece of poetry. The resulting evening was a wonderful community event enjoyed by a capacity crowd. Later the same month, FAWC supporters gathered at the waterfront home of Donald Winter and Richard Di Frummolo for an appropriately stormy evening of cocktails with Summer Faculty member Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm. This summer saw FAWC represented on Commercial Street by the FAWC Shop. Located in a space donated by Chuck Rigg and Carl Draper of The Commons, the shop was managed by Trustee Barbara Baker and showcased books and artwork by many of the artists and writers who have been Fellows, or are otherwise associated with the Fine Arts Work Center. All in all, it was a summer to remember at the Fine Arts Work Center. This past February, more than 1,000 applications were received for the eighteen visual arts and writing Fellowships for the period October 1, 1998 through May 1, 1999. The question arises as to how these odds stacked up against some other highly competitive programs:
FAWC Talk
• FAWC's new Returning Residency program brought 43 former Fellows of the Winter Fellowship program back to Provincetown to live and work once again in FAWC apartments and studios. • The Ohio Arts Council again sponsored two Fellows for a three month residency at FAWC in Summer 1998: writer Stephanie Tolan and visual artist Laura Lisbon.
• The Provincetown Arts Lottery Council provided support for a Staff- and Fellow-coordinated Winter Film Series of foreign films, providing a new cultural opportunity for Provincetown year-rounders on Wednesday evenings in January and February. • The Reeves Euler Building on Brewster Street now provides housing for Winter Fellowship Fellows, summer students and artists participating in the Long Term Residency program. • The Lannan Foundation provided FAWC with support for the fourth year of the Senior Fellowship in Literature program, which brought six writers to Provincetown for the month of September. Additionally, Lannan has shown its support of FAWC's program with the provision of a second year of support for increased monthly stipends for FAWC Fellows. • The Hand Hollow Foundation of New York once again provided support for FAWC residencies, sponsoring visual artist Lenore Malen in June, and writer Harold Crooks in September. • The Benchmark Inn of Provincetown hosted the 2nd Annual Benchmark Performance series, featuring original music and dance presentations by local performers, as part of the Fall Arts Festival. All proceeds were donated to the Fine Arts Work Center. We thank all who participated in this program, particularly host Park Davis from the Benchmark Inn. • As Provincetown prepares to celebrate its centennial as an artists' colony in 1999, FAWC took a local leadership role, bringing together other Provincetown nonprofit arts organizations for the purposes of requesting funding from the Town of Provincetown in support of off-season activities. • Much needed building repairs and renovations have begun to reshape the Work Center. Fresh paint, remodeled kitchens, new windows and more greeted the October arrival of the latest group of Fellows, with more work planned for the near future. • The 1998 October One Campaign, encouraging donations from Former Fellows to FAWC in support of the Winter Fellowship program, is underway. We hope they will give as generously as possible. • An effort to renovate and outfit the FAWC woodshop for use by Fellows and other residents has led to a call for donations of equipment. We are in need of hand and power tools to outfit the woodshop. Work Center's Stabilizing Efforts Pay Off Decisive action by the FAWC's Trustees-- and a lot of hard work by many individuals-- has begun to yield positive results for the Work Center as it finds itself in the strongest financial position in years.
Board President Hatty Walker Fitts adds, "These programs, however, are strengthened by the fact that we've had success in stabilizing the organization. For the second consecutive year, we've balanced our budget. Additionally, we have started reinstating Fellowships, increased the endowment, reduced the mortgage principle and begun making necessary repairs to our historic structures. We've seen a great deal of progress in a short period of time. With a few more years of hard work, I'm convinced that this organization will be the strongest it's even been."
"Despite these successes, however, there is still so much more that needs to be done before we are confident that the Work Center's future is secure," says Executive Director Hunter O'Hanian. "The Board has made it clear that they will not be satisfied until we have financially stabilized the organization. Over the next two years, we will redouble our efforts as we strive not only to maintain our achievements, but raise the requisite funds to pay off the mortgage and increase the endowment-no small task!" Working from its base of strength, the Work Center has begun planning a stabilization campaign to secure its future. A formal announcement is anticipated in the next few months. 31st Fellowship Season Begins The first of October marked the beginning of the Fine Arts Work Center's 31st Winter Fellowship Season. Fellows from as far away as England and California and as near as Rhode Island and Provincetown itself were welcomed by an unseasonably cold day as they helped each other unpack cars and trucks and move into their new homes and studios. In addition to acquainting themselves with each other and the beginning of Provincetown's off-season, Fellows mixed with Committee members Bill Webb, Cleopatra Mathis, Duane Slick, Pat de Groot, Roger Skillings, Alan Dugan, Judith Shahn and others during a Day One Barbecue. As some Fellows tried to remember names and find extra blankets, others aimed to grab some of Visual Arts Coordinator Doug Ritter's freshly hooked blue fish as it came off the grill. Everyone seemed eager to settle in and begin working, having survived a rigorous and discriminating evaluation process that takes place over a period of four months, with only a handful chosen each year from an application pool of over a thousand. All the Fellows come to the Work Center having made serious strides in their development as writers and artists, whether publishing their stories and poems in many of the country's most prestigious literary journals, such as The Paris Review, Poetry, Story Magazine, and The New Yorker, or exhibiting their work in shows at such venues as the Guggenheim Museum, the New Museum for Contemporary Art, Yale University, and the Rhode Island School of Design. Ahead of them lies seven months of time, space, financial support, and community which nurtures the extended concentration on current work, whether polishing and perfecting a project-in-progress or discovering new formal strategies and subjects. During the residency year, Fellows will give public readings in the Center's Stanley Kunitz Common Room, and exhibit artwork in the Hudson D. Walker Gallery. In addition, the Visiting Artists and Writers Program will bring established figures from the art and literary worlds to the Work Center to meet with Fellows and present work to the public. Visiting writers this fall include poets Claudia Rankine and Olga Broumas and novelists Caryl Phillips and Patricia Powell. A special event celebrating the publication of Fifth Season (Provincetown Arts Press) -- a book of poems by David Matias, a Former Fellow ('94-'95) who died of AIDS -- will feature poets Frank Bidart, Cleopatra Mathis, and Greg Miller. For more information see Winter Fellowship Program Boston Event Honors Ladd and Belz At the heart of the day's celebration was the Fine Arts Work Center's tribute to the accomplishments of Carl Belz, former director of the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, and Florence Ladd, former director of the Bunting Institute at Harvard. In his introduction of Belz, who has written books on art history as well as the history of rock-n-roll, FAWC Board Co-Chair Michael Mazur described him as a "man of passion and balance" who has given much support to the artists' community. Of honoree Ladd, former Writing Fellow Jayne Anne Phillips said, "Guided by unerring intelligence, judgement and compassion, Florence Ladd has nurtured artists of all colors, persuasions and temperaments as a teacher, educator, colleague, friend and inspiration." Over 100 guests-including a number of former Fellows-attended this special afternoon, which raised $15,000 in support of the Fine Arts Work Center's programs and activities. The Work Center offers special thanks to hosts Stephen Mindich and Maria Lopez, as well as to Barbara Baker, Donald Winter and Richard Di Frummolo for their roles in assuring a lovely and successful Boston area event. New Endowed Fellowships and Named Spaces
James Hansen, a gifted artist who died in 1997 at age 45, had a studio at FAWC for several summers in the 1980s, and so loved the Outer Cape that he moved here from Boston several years ago. This summer, 14 of his artist friends donated works to be sold to raise $25,000 to name one of the 11 FAWC studios after him. The list of contributing artists includes Paul Anderson, Gerry Bergstein, Paul Bowen, Aaron Fink, David Kelley, Myriam Laplante, Pasquale Natale, Kim Pashko, Cliffton Peacock, Louis Rissoli, Ron Rizzi, Claude Simard, James Stroud and Sallyann Wekstein. Hansen's family also contributed his large 1995 painting, The Burning Bush, to the Labor Day week exhibition. Although the show has concluded, the campaign to raise funds for the James Hansen Studio continues. Contact the Work Center about acquiring any of the remaining pieces of artwork. The family of Fritz Bultman has generously agreed to lead an effort to endow a Fellowship in his name. Bultman, who passed away in 1985, has work in collections around the world. Known as a leader in the abstract expressionist movement, Bultman first came to Provincetown to study with Hans Hoffman and was one of the founders of the Fine Arts Work Center. More information on this and other such campaigns is forthcoming. Anyone who wishes to contribute to any of these important campaigns may send a donation to the Fine Arts Work Center, 24 Pearl Street, Provincetown, MA 02657, or call (508) 487-9960 for more details.
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"I don't remember a summer with so many activities at the Work Center," says founder Stanley Kunitz (photo). "It seemed as if something was happening at every turn!" Indeed,
the Work Center had a summer schedule which far surpassed previous summers,
due in part to the success of the Summer Workshop Program and an ambitious
schedule of readings, exhibitions, lectures and special events.
The month of March saw FAWC Executive Director Hunter O'Hanian (photo) traveling to Ohio for the opening of the
exhibition A Change of Place, featuring work by Ohio Arts Council-sponsored
artists who have participated in residencies at FAWC and Headlands Center
for the Arts. Participating artists included Gilda Edwards, Sean Foley,
Karen Snouffer and Walter Zurko.
"It is without question that the individual
programs at the Work Center are exemplary," says Board Co-Chair Michael
Mazur (photo). "Our Winter Fellowship and Summer Workshop programs
are unequaled. We receive increased interest and praise from around the
nation and world. One simply has to review the ever-growing list of prizes
and awards bestowed upon our former Fellows and Summer Workshop faculty
and students to appreciate the strength of our programs."
"The transformation of the Work Center, internally
and externally, is extraordinary," says poet Marie Howe (photo), a
1983-'84 Writing Fellow and currently one of the participants in the Long
Term Residency Program. "From the newly painted shutters and pruned
trees to the dozens of extraordinary poets talking and working together
twelve months a year, the Work Center gives off a dynamic energy that you
can feel throughout the country."
Iva Kaplan Ashner (photo), a vice president at W.W. Norton & Company publishers
and a Provincetown summer resident, passed away in March. As an editor,
she was known for distinguished contributions in the areas of environmental
affairs, travel and food, and as a seasonal resident was an active supporter
of local artists. Her wish to create an on-going legacy for emerging writers
has been translated through donations, which continue to arrive from family,
friends and colleagues, into the Iva Kaplan Ashner Writing Fellowship.