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Invitation to art

By Debbie Hagan

Depressing as prisons on the outside, dazzling as jewel boxes on the inside. Such dichotomies exist among New England mill buildings converted to art studios, which somehow add to their charm and mystique. Closed to the public most of the year, these buildings leave art and crafts lovers wondering what goes on behind their fortressed facades.

However, around the holidays, artists break from their cloistered lives and invite the public in. Such openings provide rare chances to buy art and one-of-a-kind handmade gifts. A warning, though: Once inside, it's easy to lose sight of gift buying and concentrate on one's self, which is not entirely bad either.

Over the next few weeks, three well-known art communities will be open: Brickbottom Artists' Building in Somerville, the Button Factory in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and One Cottage Street in Easthampton. Hot mulled wine, cookies, and assorted refreshments, plus chats with artists, demonstrations, and poetry readings are all highlights of these festivities.

The first of the three openings is Saturday and Sunday at Brickbottom. This event draws as many as 5,000 visitors. Technically, Brickbottom isn't a mill building, but two king-sized warehouses connected by a courtyard. No doubt you've seen the curious beige buildings with aqua stripes just off the McGrath/O'Brien Highway.

Inside are 151 condominiums where craftspeople - potters, jewelers, fiber artists, photographers, digital artists, printmakers, painters, and sculptors - work and live. Of those, 75 artists plan to lay out welcome mats next weekend, including Debra Olin, who creates evocative mixed media prints made from her grandmother's garments; Ricki Moss, who combines digital with traditional printmaking processes to create dynamic contemporary prints; Robert Goss, who creates small booklike works with found images, text, and magnets; and David Tonnesen, who makes steel sculptures.

This year, more emphasis will be placed on art education, says Felice Regan, a silkscreen poster maker and show organizer. She encourages artists to tell visitors how the art is created. "This enables them to enjoy it a lot more," she says. That will be done through informational posters, step-by-step photographs, and demonstrations.

At the Brickbottom Gallery, smaller works by artists - even those not participating in the open house - will be on display. A portion of these sales will fund a scholarship for a Somerville High School art student.

Opening its doors December 2 and 3 is the Button Factory, located in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. More than 50 artists - photographers, furniture makers, painters, sculptors, jewelers, metalsmiths, fiber artists, and other craftspeople - will show their work during this two-day event. In addition to the open studios, there will be a juried art exhibition set up in the hallways of the building.

In the 19th century, this three-story, red brick building was a factory that produced buttons for shoes. As fashions changed, manufacturers made other types of buttons. However, by the 1960s, textile production, including button making, had moved to the South, and new types of manufacturing moved in. The excess space in the building was rented to local artists.

Something about the idea of artists working under one roof intrigued Jim Buttrick, a photographer, and Peter Bowers, a furniture maker. In 1986, they bought the building and drew in even more artists and craftspeople, whose work ranged from organ making to bookbinding. Buttrick has opened up a studio there, bringing his abstract black-and-white photographs just for the openings.

Other participants include RickaMae, whose lifelong interest in old buttons - which she uses in jewelry, boxes, and small tables - echoes the original spirit of the place. For the open house, she shows whimsical and inexpensive metal-etched earrings, picture frames, switch plates, and ornaments. Fiber artist Leslie MacNeil makes felt hats and hand-dyed textile clocks. Paulette Werger, Kristine Lane, and Donna Heald, who refer to themselves as the Metal People, create earrings, broaches, and rings, as well as upscale jewelry, in addition to ornaments and pewter vessels. For personal gifts, bookbinder Lynne Crocker creates handmade books that can be used as guest registries, photo albums, wedding scrapbooks, or journals.

New this year, 10 area poets, who call themselves the Studio Poets, will do readings throughout the building. In addition, on December 1, from 5 to 7 p.m., a fine-art show will feature the works of many painters and sculptors.

Coincidentally, there's another open house December 1, 2, and 3 at yet another old button factory: One Cottage Street in Easthampton. This hulk of brick and mortar is hard to miss. Its 168,000 square feet houses artists like Janna Ugone, who creates exotic lamps with hand-painted parchment and low-fired earthenware shades. These contemporary pieces are so popular that some people arrive early on Friday, line up outside, and run to get their lamps as soon as the doors open. Also at One Cottage Street is Lynn Latimer, who makes colorful carved glass bowls, platters, boxes, and African-inspired masks from iridescent glass.

At Kaleidoscope Pottery, three artists - Peter Feitner, Christy Knox, and Evelyn Snyder - make high-fired stoneware, called Leafware. Plates, bowls, and dinnerware are formed into molds. Before drying the clay, the artists press leaves gathered from their gardens into it. The plant material burns off in the kiln, leaving fossillike impressions.

Multitalented artist Elizabeth Solomon creates paintings and small sculptures, and Leni Fried creates monotypes, cityscapes, Caribbean-inspired linocuts, and sandblasted recycled bottles. She turns some of her prints into hanging Japanese-style lanterns and table lamps.

These and other artists contribute to a raffle of 30 items. Proceeds benefit Riverside Industries, a nonprofit sheltered workshop for the mentally and physically disabled, which owns the building.

As for the holiday studio openings, Fried, who participates in both One Cottage Street's and Brickbottom's open houses, says this is a chance to see artists' work that is never shown in galleries, since many of the participants sell their work exclusively at shows and by commission. "When you go into galleries, you don't even get to meet the artists," says Fried. "The studio opening is a great time to buy art. Truly, there's no better way to invest and purchase art than by meeting the artists."


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