Real Art Ways | Independent Cinema | Contemporary Art | Live Art

Saturday, July 8, 2:30 PM. Free admission, no RSVP required.

You’re invited to a gallery talk with artist Romina Chuls, who will discuss the current exhibition parir los pétalos at Real Art Ways. Chuls is a recipient of a 2022 Real Art Award.

Romina Chuls (b. 1991, Lima) holds an M.A in Arts Politics from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and a Bachelor in Fine Arts, with a major in painting, from the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Peru. Later, Romina continued her training with several Peruvian pre-hispanic textile courses, such as brocade weaving, Paracas ringed knitting and backstrap weaving. She completed a residency focus on Mexican embroidery at Arquetopia (2017), in Oaxaca, Mexico. She participated in the Artists in Residence program at Textile Arts Center (2018-2019) and she was granted a residency at Gasworks ceramic studio (2019), both in New York City.

BARRICADE
Jim Whitten

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by Jim Whitten. Curated by David Borawski.

Using found materials and appropriated film and television stills, Whitten examines the implications of improvised barricades in our cultural and political moment. The show’s centerpiece finds Whitten recreating a bedroom interior with furniture piled against the door. Framed by a bisected press image from the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol, the work questions subjective notions of threat and safety, especially as manipulated by right wing media outlets. Many elements reference home interiors and American consumer products, through which Whitten asks:

BARRICADE

Who’s on one side?
Who’s on the other side?
What does one of them want?
What does the other one want?
Will the barricade hold?
If not, how long does it hold for?
Does this extra time provide an opportunity?

Is everyone safe?

About the Artist

Jim Whitten is a conceptual artist with a strong interest in Fluxus art.

His project, SNFFBX, has created virtual and in-person art shows, released 4 artist books,
and offered art bundles that have represented over 20 artists. SNFFBX also began a pop-up gallery called No Fly List with fellow artist, Christa Whitten.

Supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Creative Cocktail Hour

Live music, art exhibitions, DJ. Come as you are.

Everybody is welcoming, conversations abound, people connect.

Come with friends, come by yourself, hangout. Creative Cocktail Hour is a great way to meet new people!

Music:

QUITAPENAS

This tropical Afro-Latin combo borrows aesthetics from the radical 60s, 70s and 80s. Each song echoes a remix of history and invites one to engage in the liberating evenings of Angola, Peru, Colombia, Brazil and beyond. The name means “to remove worries.” The mission of QUITAPENAS is simple: to make you dance and leave you without a worry. Using the healing mix of guitar, saxophone, keyboards, bass, and percussion, they will keep you moving to the music all throughout their performance.

DJ: Sonia Sol

Sonia Sol is a traveling performing artist, open format DJ, singer, and acrobatic dancer currently living / touring in Latin America as well as North America. Born & raised in Hartford, Sonia draws a lot of inspiration from her Jamaican roots incorporating island sounds throughout her show experience. Through her voice she uses an eclectic blend of Neo-Soul, Reggae, & R&B sounds. As an open format DJ she blends all sounds but loves House, Hip-Hop, Afrobeats, and more.

DJ Mr. Realistic:

DJ Mr. Realistic and Real Art Ways have a longstanding relationship! He has been our house DJ for CCH for many years, and is the owner of My House Radio, a multicultural, award-winning internet broadcast radio station focusing on all genres of house music.

Art Exhibitions:

Exhibition opening in the Real Room:

Barricade, curated by David Borawski

BARRICADE

Who’s on one side?
Who’s on the other side?
What does one of them want?
What does the other one want?
Will the barricade hold?
If not, how long does it hold for?
Does this extra time provide an opportunity?
Is everyone safe?

Speaking Sentences Backwards – Paloma Izquierdo, Miguel Gaydosh, Matthew Schreiber, Laura Henriksen, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, and Dylan Hausthor

A Temporary Weight – Roni Aviv

parir los pétalos – Romina Chuls

Food Truck:

Auntie’s Pasta

Hands-on art making activities based on current exhibitions.

CCH will be outside starting 6/15 – weather permitting!

Hartford Brass Band Bonanza 2023

Real Art Ways presents the Hartford Brass Bonanza! Featuring The Hartford Hot Several, Hartford’s Proud Drill Drum and Dance Corp, Rara Bel Pose, Fiesta Del Norte, Extra Syrup. If it rains, we will be hosting this event in our gallery spaces indoors.

This performance is free to the public with performances starting at 12:00pm. Support for this event comes from the Evelyn W. Preston Memorial Fund.

Food truck: Samba’s Cuisine

Bringing lawn chairs is strongly encouraged!

The Hartford Hot Several

We’re Hartford’s pep band. We show up whenever we want, wherever we want, to play some tunes to make you smile and dance! Hartford needed a funky marching band to bring brass, ruckus, and joy to all the parties. In 2012, we set out to be that band.

Hartford’s Proud Drill Drum and Dance Corp.

Hartford’s Proud Drill, Drum, and Dance Corp. Integrate sound, movement and artistry in the overall development of young and expose youth to bigger and greater opportunities so that they excel academically, socially, and artistically throughout life. Hartford’s Proud serves youth between the ages of 5 – 24 and strives to accomplish our mission by using the power of sound and rhythm to support youth in the development of physical and emotional skills that will aid them in conducting successful lives.

Rara Bel Poze

Rara Bel Poze is a modern Haitian street band from Boston, MA that produces an astonishing mix of world beats bringing the Haitian culture to life through the use of acoustic instruments along with custom horns & drums. The band consists of 20 uniquely talented members whose live performances revisits what make cultural roots music so meaningful and powerful.

Because of their exhilarating and live shows, the band have quickly earned a reputation not only in the Boston Community but across many cities, states and Canada. The group’s dynamic and unique sound has earned recognition by the City Councils of Boston, MA & Randolph, MA for their hard work, dedication and superb performance at the Boston Caribbean Carnival & J’ouvert.

The band believes in promoting love, peace and unity through the beat of their music and their mission is to keep the Haitian culture alive. Ayibobo!

Fiesta Del Norte

Dressed in traditional sombreros and “charro” outfits, our repertoire spans from the Mariachis of Jalisco to the Nortenas of Chihuahua, to the harp music of Vera Cruz, down to the Marimba music of Chiapas. All this played on authentic instruments such as guitar, vihuela, guitarron, violin, trumpet and with beautiful singing.

Extra Syrup

Extra Syrup Horns centers its sound around classic R&B, Hip Hop and Pop. Their sound is soulfully tight, evoking a southern marching band swagger with a drive that only a city can produce. Their energy is infectious whether it’s a 5-piece stage show or 6-piece mobile setup. ESH performed at Blue Note NYC in 2019, Symphony Space in 2020 and Metropolitan Museum of Art’s METFEST in 2021. The group is bi-coastal and led by Bryan Walters (NYC) and Chanell “tubafresh” Crichlow (LA) of the well-loved PitchBlak Brass Band, currently on hiatus.

Kris Allen and Benjamin Lanz in Concert

Real Art Ways presents a free concert on Wednesday, 9/13 at 7:30pm featuring West Hartford native’s Kris Allen and Ben Lanz. Admission is free. Funding for this performance is provided by the Evelyn Preston Fund.

Their group Allen Lanz is an electroacoustic, synths and horns team of multi-instrumentalist Ben Lanz and saxophonist Kris Allen. Ben and Kris, who’ve known each other practically since birth (and started playing music together shortly after) got together in 2021 to start working on this project, blending and interacting their acoustic instruments with generative modular synthesis and these explorations organically blossomed into a collection of sonically immersive songs, improvisations and soundscapes. Allen Lanz brings influence from Ben and Kris’ respective musical worlds, Indie Rock and Jazz. Allen Lanz fills out their live band with drummer Robin Baytas. They will be touring as a trio this fall in support of their upcoming release Ballard on Brassland Records. The album’s name, Ballard, comes from the West Hartford street where Ben grew up.

Kris Allen

Kris Allen is an American saxophonist, composer, educator, and recording artist. He can be found touring widely as a leader or as part of the collaboratively-led “Triangle Offense” trio with Jonathan Barber and Matt Dwonszyk. He has also enjoyed a long career as a sought-after sideman, working in the groups of Illinois Jacquet, Gerald Wilson, Andy Gonzales, Jimmy Greene, Helen Sung, Winard Harper, Andy Laverne, the Mingus Dynasty, Avery Sharpe, Andy Jaffe, Earl Macdonald, Noah Baerman, Ike Sturm, Rogerio Boccato, Kendrick Oliver’s New Life Orchestra, the Curtis Brothers, and Mario Pavone among others. As a composer, Kris has been honored with numerous awards, commissions and residencies including a State of Connecticut Artist Fellowship and a Macdowell Artist Colony Residency. He has collaborated with dancers, poets, and visual artists, as well as musicians from across diverse genres. More information on Kris can be found here.

Benjamin Lanz

Benjamin Lanz is a multi instrumental musician, arranger, songwriter, and composer. Most commonly associated with the bands The National and Beirut, Ben has also worked with Sufjan Stevens, Booker T Jones, Taylor Swift, and Sharon Van Etten. As a horn player, mainly a trombonist, but tuba and other horns as well, Benjamin has performed across the musical spectrum, from The Kočani Arkester, to The Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra, to Anthony Braxton and everything in between. As a guitarist and multi instrumentalist, Ben fronts the band LNZNDRF with Scott and Bryan Devendorf (The National) and Aaron Arntz (Beirut, Grizzly Bear), as well as his own solo songwriting project LANZ. More information on Benjamin can be found here.

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Robin Baytas

Robin Baytas, a native of Montclair, New Jersey, and currently based in New York City, has toured worldwide with artists such as Claudio Roditi, Rachel Z, and Michael Mayo, performing at venues such as the Playboy Jazz Festival, Jazz at Lincoln Center, and the North Sea Jazz Festival. Having worked with indie-rock and pop bands in addition to jazz artists, his expertise and passions extend into electronics, synthesizers and techno production

Mark Dresser, Gerry Hemingway, and Marilyn Crispell in Concert

Real Art Ways presents a free summer concert on Friday, 7/7 at 7:30pm featuring Mark Dresser on bass, Gerry Hemmingway on percussion, and Marilyn Crispell on piano. Admission is free. Funding for this performance is provided by the Evelyn Preston Fund.

Mark Dresser – bass

“Calling contrabassist Mark Dresser a virtuoso is like saying Albert Einstein was good at math.” San Diego City Times.

“Mr. Dresser, a bassist who is one of the great instrumental forces in recent American jazz outside of the mainstream.” – New York Times

Mark Dresser is a Grammy nominated, internationally renowned bass player, improviser, composer, and interdisciplinary collaborator. He has recorded over one hundred forty CDs including three solo CDs and a DVD. From 1985 to 1994, he was a member of Anthony Braxton’s Quartet, which recorded nine CDs and was the subject of Graham Locke’s book Forces in Motion (Da Capo). He has also performed and recorded music of Ray Anderson, Jane Ira Bloom, Tim Berne, Anthony Davis, Dave Douglas, Osvaldo Golijov, Gerry Hemingway, Bob Ostertag, Joe Lovano, Roger Reynolds, Henry Threadgill, Dawn Upshaw, John Zorn. Dresser most recent and internationally acclaimed new music for jazz quintet, Nourishments (2013) his latest CD (Clean Feed) marks his re-immersion as a bandleader. Since 2007 he has been deeply involved in telematic music performance and education. He was awarded a 2015 Shifting Foundation Award and 2015 Doris Duke Impact Award. He is Professor of Music at University of California, San Diego. More information can be found here.

Gerry Hemingway – Drums/Percussion

Gerry Hemingway is an American drummer and composer. Hemingway was a member of the Anthony Braxton quartet from 1983 to 1994. He has also performed with Ernst Reijseger, Anthony Davis, Earl Howard, Leo Smith, George E. Lewis, Ray Anderson, Mark Helias, Reggie Workman, Michael Moore, Oliver Lake, Marilyn Crispell, Christy Doran, John Wolf Brennan, Don Byron, Cecil Taylor, and Cuong Vu.

Hemingway received a Guggenheim Fellowship for his work in music composition in 2000, and was a student of Alan Dawson. He is a graduate of Foote School in New Haven. He has recorded on over one hundred albums for the labels Clean Feed, Enja, hatArt, Palmetto, Random Acoustics, and Tzadik. He owns his own label, Auricle. More information can be found here.

Marilyn Crispell – Piano

“Hearing Marilyn Crispell play solo piano is like monitoring an active volcano. She is one of a very few pianists who rise to the challenge of free jazz.” – New York Times

“Marilyn Crispell….has been one of the most deliciously unpredictable and distinctive piano improvisers in jazz for more than four decades.” – The Chicago Reader

Marilyn Crispell has been a composer and performer of contemporary improvised music since 1978. For ten years, she was a member of the Anthony Braxton Quartet and the Reggie Workman Ensemble, and she has performed and recorded extensively as a soloist and with players on the American and international jazz scene, also working with dancers, poets, film-makers and visual artists, and teaching workshops in improvisation. She has been the recipient of three New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship grants, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust composition commission. For more information, click here.

Photo by: Claire Stefani

Creative Cocktail Hour

Live music, art exhibitions, DJ, and you. Come as you are.

A monthly experience of art, community, and connection in Hartford.

Everybody is welcome, conversations abound, people connect.

Come with friends, come by yourself, hangout. Creative Cocktail Hour is a great way to meet new people!

Featuring:

Live Music: Nelson Bello & Friends: funk, soul, rhythm and blues with Nelson Bello on percussion, Dexter Pettaway on drums, Simone Moñe on vocals, Will Price on saxophone, Asa Livingston on bass, and Jeremiah Fuller on piano.

A Performance from The Dance Collective: The Dance Collective aims to empower women to have a voice and an equal opportunity in dance by providing choreographic and leadership opportunities. By sharing professional contemporary dance with new audiences and providing performances in diverse locations, they work to bridge the gap between the arts and our community. Their studio space in Hartford, CT provides creatives with a home to hone in on their movement vocabulary and we hold the belief that everyone can dance and everyone should.

Music from DJ Mr. Realistic

Art Exhibitions from:

Paloma Izquierdo, Miguel Gaydosh, Matthew Schreiber, Laura Henriksen, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, Dylan Hausthor

Food Truck: Mama Nena

Hands-on Art Making Activities

& You!

Creative Cocktail Hour is about community and expression.

Buy your tickets online and skip the line at the door!

parir los pétalos
Romina Chuls

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by 2022 Real Art Award recipient Romina Chuls.

Researcher and multidisciplinary artist Romina Chuls explores feminist issues surrounding Peruvian and Latin American women in their daily lives. Through drawing, sculpture, indigenous embroidery and knitting techniques, Chuls scrutinizes territorial demarcation, nationalism, and sexual and reproductive rights.

In the exhibition parir los pétalos (translating to ‘give birth to the petals’), Chuls imagines a ceremony of physical, emotional and spiritual abortions defined by interdependencies and pleasure. A recent sculptural series of ceramics and textiles represents vestiges of past and future abortion practices, augmented by cross-knit looping relating to a Nasca mantle dated 100 – 300 CE (currently in the collection of the Brooklyn Museum). The graphite drawings of Embriones Huaco similarly reference the forms from Nasca and Mochica huacos, with cross-knit looping puncturing the paper surface. Informed by her study of pre-Hispanic textiles and ceramics archives, Chuls articulates an understanding of abortion as part of a collective and more-than-human fertility cycle.

About the Artist

About the Real Art Awards

The Real Art Awards is an annual opportunity for emerging artists living in New England, New Jersey, or New York. The open call, offered with no entry fees to artists, attracts hundreds of applicants each year, of which 6 artists are chosen. Selected artists receive a solo exhibition, with a commissioned essay, professional documentation, and a cash prize of $2,500. The 2022 Real Art Awards was juried by multidisciplinary artist Carlos Motta, curator and creative strategist Yona Backer, and Real Art Ways Executive Director Will K. Wilkins. The 2022 Real Art Awards is supported in part by awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Edward C. & Ann T. Roberts Foundation.

A Temporary Weight
Roni Aviv

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by Roni Aviv. Curated by Cody Boyce.

Aviv stages and photographs flat surfaces to comment on the opacity and invisibility of experiences in everyday life. She traces, erases, attaches and spills, pointing to material metaphors that address the difficulties of literal expression. Through her work, Aviv navigates the gaps between experience, language and image. Words become part of a larger story, where the paper’s surface is as important as the letterforms atop it. A motif of floods and minor aftermaths is woven throughout the exhibition, with paper holding the weight of the words mixed with water and ink.

In the book under standing, Aviv meditates on inner conflicts and psychological processing. A thread of actions and reactions builds tension as a fragmented narrative is slowly revealed through the examination of found texts: hand traced pieces from a psychology book, web engine answers, an apology letter. Elements of the source material are intertwined with photographs, creating an expressive material play. Words are traced to paper, embossed on napkins, erased and rubbed with bare hands, glued together. Touch and affect are explored through mark-making and residue. Aviv uses material failures to look at emotional instability alongside resilience.

About the Artist

Roni Aviv is a photographer based in New York. Aviv holds an MFA in Visual Arts from Columbia University and studied photography at Cooper Union and Bezalel Academy of Art. Her work has been published and exhibited internationally. Recent exhibitions include Longwood Art Gallery, Tiger Strikes Asteroid, Steve Turner Gallery, The Jewish Museum and Indie Gallery. Aviv has recently been published in BOMB, GRANTA, Erev Rav, and Lines Inside by TSA_PDF magazines. Recent residencies and fellowships include NARS Foundation (2021), Center for Book Arts (2022) and AIM Bronx Museum (2023).

Supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Riverwood Poetry Series

The Series takes place in-person on the second Wednesday of the month from September 2022 through May 2023. Each night begins with a poetry reading featuring regionally- or nationally-known poets, followed by an open mic – one poem, one page.

Join us for this in-person reading! Audience mask wearing is strongly encouraged, but not required.

The author’s books will be available to buy for book signing and conversation. Beer, wine, soft drinks, and snacks will be available for purchase.

May’s Poets:

Christie Max Williams is a writer and award winning actor. His debut poetry collection, The Wages of Love, won the 2022 William Meredith Poetry Prize. Originally from California and then New York City, he now lives in Mystic, Connecticut where he and his wife raise their daughter and son. He has worked as an actor and director in California, New York, and Connecticut. He has also worked as a fruit vendor in Paris, a salmon fisherman in Alaska, a consultant on Wall Street, a writer for the National Audubon Society, and in leadership posts for non-profit organizations. He co-founded, and for many years directed, the Arts Cafe Mystic, which is in its 29th year of presenting programs featuring readings by America’s best poets, complemented by music of New England’s finest musicians. His poetry has been published in journals, magazines, and anthologies, and has won the Grolier Prize, placed second in the Connecticut River Review Contest, and was a finalist for the National Poetry Series.

Doug Anderson is widely published in peer reviewed journals and has written books of poems, plays, short stories, a memoir, book reviews, and essays. He has received awards and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Massachusetts Cultural Counsel, and Poets & Writers. His book, The Moon Reflected Fire, won the Kate Tufts Discovering Award and Blues for Unemployed Secret Police a grant from the Eric Matthieu King Fund of the Academy of American Poets. He has a new poetry in Nine Mile, The Massachusetts Review, and The San Pedro River Review. His poetry book, Horse Medicine, was published by Barrow Street Books in 2015. He will read from his most recent book of poems, Undress, She Said, published by Four Way Books in 2022.

About Riverwood Poetry Series

The Riverwood Poetry Series, Inc. is a non-profit arts organization committed to the promotion and appreciation of poetry in Connecticut. RPS, Inc. is invested in providing entertaining and thought-provoking programming, while responding to the needs of our neighbors through community outreach and collaboration. From their Facebook page: “The Riverwood Poetry Series has innovated many programs since our inception, all of them free to the public. We provide entertaining and thought-provoking poetry in a relaxed atmosphere.”

Speaking Sentences Backwards

“[Haunting] points to the non-full, non-total presence of being. In every being there’s always already an absence of presence, an inheritance, a trace of that which was and that which is to come. In every being there is a haunting.”

– Ezekiel Dixon-Román in “Haunting, Blackness, and Algorithmic Thought”

Real Art Ways presents a group exhibition featuring Paloma Izquierdo, Miguel Gaydosh, Matthew Schreiber, Laura Henriksen, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, and Dylan Hausthor, curated by Cody Boyce. An opening reception will be held Thursday, April 20, 6–10 PM during the monthly Creative Cocktail Hour event.

The works in Speaking Sentences Backwards are haunted: by history and myth, by extractive processes of capitalist industry, by anti-Black policing and government surveillance, by conspiracies both real and imagined. They are also haunted by possibility and loss, by futures promised but not yet realized.

Through photography, sculpture, video, sound, holography, poetry, and design, Speaking Sentences Backwards points to ephemeral traces at the periphery. The featured artists look to broaden thresholds of perception, receiving signals through environment, radio waves, sub-bass frequencies, interference patterns—the infra- and ultra- ranges of experience. These efforts are marked by a fixation with technologies of recording and transmission—mechanisms through which the invisible or intangible is captured and represented. They are also characterized by strategies of concealment and alteration, through which spaces of privacy and intimacy are claimed from existing structures.

Photo Credit: John Groo

Supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Knuckleball

Stephen Haynes returns to Real Art Ways to share his latest project – delayed for three years by the pandemic – a pocket brass band called Knuckleball. Expect the unexpected!

“A knuckleball is like trying to hit a butterfly in a typhoon. It shakes side to side; it may go straight left on one pitch. It might go straight down to a right-hander on another pitch. It may stay on the very same plane on one pitch. The thing that makes a knuckleball effective is that you cannot predict which way the ball is going to move, which makes it an extremely hard pitch to hit.” – RA Dickey (Interviewed by Terry Gross).

The performance will feature Stephen Haynes on cornet, flugelhorn; Taylor Ho Bynum on cornet, flugelhorn; Herb Robertson on cornet, flugelhorn; Sam Newsome on soprano saxophone; Josh Roseman on tenor trombone; Ben Stapp on tuba, sousaphone; and Eric Rosenthal on drums / percussion.

Stephen Haynes is an improviser, arts organizer and recording artist. His practice ranges from small groups to large orchestras with a focus on working directly with composers in the development of new music. His work is featured on Pillars, Tyshawn Sorey’s groundbreaking work for octet released on Firehouse 12 Records. He is also a founding member of Adam Rudolph’s East Coast version of Go: Organic Orchestra. Over the past 40 years, he has worked with a range of vanguard composers including Bill Dixon, Cecil Taylor, George Russell, Butch Morris, Rhys Chatham, LaMonte Young and Earle Brown.

Funded in part by the New England States Touring program of the New England Foundation for the Arts, made possible with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts Regional Touring Program and the six New England state arts agencies.

Creative Cocktail Hour

Live music, art exhibitions, food and drinks, and you. Come as you are!

Creative Cocktail Hour is about the people. Everybody is welcome, conversations abound, people connect.

Live Music:

Fabian Almazan – Piano

Fabian Almazan is a Cuban-American pianist/composer. During the completion of his jazz piano bachelor’s degree at the Manhattan School of Music, Almazan immersed himself in the realm of orchestral composition studying instrumentation and orchestration with Mr. Giampaolo Bracali. He is the founder and director of Biophilia Records and has worked diligently towards ensuring a continued dialogue of awareness concerning music and environmental justice. He has toured his music extensively as well as accompanied artists such as Linda May Han Oh, Terence Blanchard, Gretchen Parlato, John Hollenbeck, Mark Guiliana, Dave Douglass, Avishai Cohen and Ambrose Akinmusire among others.

Awards include 2 Grammy nominations, the SWR New Jazz Meeting commission, the Copland Fund, the Jerome Fund for Emerging Composers Award, the Jazz Gallery Residency, Rockerfeller Brothers Residency, Cintas Foundation Award in Composition and the Sundance Composers’ Lab.

For more information on Fabian Almazan, please visit their website.

Linda May Han Oh – Bass

“Her innovative range and stellar improvisations have made [her] one of the most dynamic rising stars in jazz today.” – The Wall Street Journal

“Engrossing, shapeshifting… [her] vibrant tone, close control and confident attack immediately established why she is such an in-demand performer.” The Financial Times

Linda May Han Oh is a Grammy award-winning bassist and composer and recorded with artists such as Pat Metheny, Kenny Barron, Joe Lovano, Dave Douglas, Terri Lyne Carrington, Steve Wilson, Geri Allen and Vijay Iyer. She was voted the 2018-2021 Bassist of the Year by the Jazz Journalist’s Association, as well 2022 Bassist of the Year in Jazztimes. Linda also was voted 2019 Bassist of the Year in Hothouse Magazine and was the 2020 recipient APRA award for Best New Jazz Work. In 2023 she received the prestigious Herb Albert Award for music.

Linda is currently Associate Professor at the Berklee College of Music in the bass department and is also part of the Institute for Jazz and Gender Justice led by Terri Lyne Carrington. Linda was featured on bass in the 2020 Pixar movie “Soul” under the musical direction of Jon Batiste (The Late Show with Stephen Colbert) alongside drummer Roy Haynes and was the model for the character in the film – bassist “Miho.”

For more information, please visit her website.

Troy Roberts – Tenor Saxophone

“He amply demonstrates that it’s possible to pay homage to the great tenor players of jazz and still create a fresh approach that leaves the listener always in anticipation of what he’ll come up with next.” – James Morrison

Troy Roberts is a two-time Grammy nominated Australian saxophonist & composer. He is based in New York City, maintaining a busy performance & recording schedule around the globe with some of the greatest jazz artists of today, and is currently celebrating his 14th release, ‘Nu-Jive: Nations United’ (Toy Robot Music).

Roberts has received numerous accolades including three DownBeat SM Jazz Soloist Awards, 2 Grammy Nominations, and was semi-finalist in the 2008 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Saxophone Competition. Graduating with a Bachelor of Music at the young age of 19, he has performed around Europe and the US extensively with artists such as Jeff ‘Tain’ Watts, Joey DeFrancesco, James Morrison, Aretha Franklin, Van Morrison, Christian McBride, Sammy Figueroa, Billy Hart, Dave Douglas, Orrin Evans and Kurt Elling to name a few, and also completed a Masters Degree at The University of Miami. As an educator, Roberts has presented numerous masterclasses and clinics at prestigious colleges, conservatoriums and universities around the world.

In 2012, he shared the stage in an international septet comprised of jazz giants Wayne Shorter, Richard Bona, Vinnie Colaiuta and Zakir Hussein for Herbie Hancock’s launch of International Jazz Day at The UN, NYC. He was also part of Hancock’s 2014 International Jazz Day held in Osaka, Japan performing with jazz luminaries such as Gregory Porter, Marcus Miller, Roy Hargrove, Esperanza Spaulding and John Scofield. As a long-time New York City resident, Troy maintains a busy performance and recording schedule around the globe with some of the greatest jazz artists of today, and is currently celebrating his fourteenth release as a leader, ‘NU-JIVE: Nations United’ (Toy Robot Music).

For more information, please visit his website.

Zack O’Farrill – Drums

Zack O’Farrill is a multi-racial, multi-cultural, multi-musical artist. He has studied with musicians such as Dave Meade, Vince Cherico, Victor Jones, Kendrick Scott, Justin Dicioccio, John Riley, Miles Okazaki, Roy Nathanson, Arturo O’Farrill, Joe Gonzalez, and many more. He received a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts from the CUNY Macaulay Honors College at City College. He is currently working on his Master’s Degree in Jazz Percussion from the Manhattan School of Music.

O’Farrill is also a dedicated educator who has taught in after-school music programs in New York City since 2010. He is the director of the Fat Afro Latin Jazz Cats youth big band, which offers free instruction to talented and deserving high school students from all boroughs. He has been a faculty member of the Flynn Center Latin Jazz for Teens camp in Burlington Vermont for 7 years. He also teaches privately at his home in Brooklyn. If you’re interested in studying with Zack, click here.

As a composer Zack has had compositions featured on recordings with the Marquès Stinson O’Farrill Trio, the Eco-Music Big Band, and his composition “There’s a Statue of José Martí in Central Park” closes the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra’s Grammy-winning record Cuba: The Conversation Continues (listen here). Zack currently leads his own quartet, performing his original music, and is in the process of planning his first record as a leader.

For more information, please visit his website.

DJ Mr. Realistic

Art Exhibitions:

Alan Neider: ‘Round About Midnight

Karl Goulet: Real Wall

Three new gallery exhibition openings in our far, middle, and main galleries!

Main/Video Gallery: Speaking Sentences Backwards; featuring works from Paloma Izquierdo, Miguel Gaydosh, Matthew Schreiber, Laura Henriksen, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste, and Dylan Hausthor
Middle Gallery: Parir los pétalos by 2022 Real Art Award Recipient Romina Chuls
Far Gallery: A Temporary Weight by Roni Aviv

Food Truck

Rolling Roti: an authentic Guyanese food truck serving the downtown Hartford area

Hands-on Art Making Activities led by Real Art Ways Staff

& You!

Creative Cocktail Hour is about community and expression.

Buy your tickets online!

Real Wall: Karl Goulet

Real Art Ways presents a Real Wall installation by Karl Goulet. Curated by David Borawski.

Goulet works between painting and sculpture to create layered abstract forms that embody concepts of identity and memory. In Goulet’s words, these works “glorify larger bodies – bodies that aren’t typically represented or appreciated in our society.” Using acrylic, latex, paper and fabric, Goulet connects “the physicality of [his] materials with the fleshiness of the body.”

“There is a powerful negative public mentality that plus-sized bodies are shameful or undesired and should be hidden or covered, which has always tormented me. I want to use this series to embrace a change in mentality and to become more comfortable in my own skin by revealing and emphasizing the power of fat and flesh.”

Real Wall is a series of wall-mounted exhibitions taking place in between formal gallery spaces. Artists are invited to experiment with the space in short-run exhibitions.

About the Artist

Karl Goulet was born and raised in northwest Connecticut. He received his Bachelors of Fine Arts Degree in Painting from the Hartford Art School, University of Hartford, in 2014. In 2012, Goulet began an internship at Five Points Gallery, where he has grown through the ranks and is currently the full-time Gallery Director and co-curator at Five Points Gallery, the flagship location of the Five Points Center for the Visual Arts. As a curator, Goulet has worked to curate over 100 group and solo exhibitions, working alongside hundreds of artists from across the world. Outside of Five Points, Goulet has served as juror and curator for multiple exhibitions throughout CT including for The Warner Theatre, Melanie Carr Gallery, and Trinity Lime Rock Gallery. Goulet has had the opportunity to work with the DECD, Connecticut Office of the Arts as a juror for Public Art in 2018 and as a judge for the Litchfield Hills Creative Awards in 2019. Also in 2019, he was selected to speak on a three-person panel on the role of artists in the community and as an artist and activist at the University of Hartford’s Alumni Forum. Goulet creates work across multiple disciplines including painting, drawing, sculpture, and mixed-media. Goulet has exhibited his work nationally. He is a member of the Five Points Launchpad. In 2021, he was awarded an Emerging Recognition Fellowship from the Connecticut Office of the Arts.

‘Round About Midnight
Alan Neider

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by Alan Neider. Curated by David Borawski.

Neider’s circular paintings incorporate quilted moving blankets and fabric, handled in an expressive and gestural manner. Working on up to ten pieces at once, Neider feels his studio process leads to moments of surprise, where paintings begin to inform one another.

“My work has always been about painting. I built out from the surface of my first paintings because the forms needed to come out into space…I create/build difficult and challenging surfaces to paint. I believe these surfaces in conjunction with the inherent textures of wood, fabric and ceramics lead to a richer, more complex experience.”

For Neider, color, patterns, and texture from found fabrics are “used as a stand in for painting. The fabrics are cut into random shapes, sewn onto the substrates in a collaged manner. This step is repeated a number of times until a visually complex, thick textured surface is created. The painting process often takes months to complete since I work in layers and spend a great deal of time ‘looking’ at the work(s).”

‘Round About Midnight brings together work from Neider’s Circle Paintings series, alongside a smaller piece from Loops in Space.

About the Artist

Alan Neider received an AA from El Camino Jr. College, a BA in Ceramics from California State Un. at Long Beach, an MFA in Sculpture from Washington Un. in St. Louis, MO. While in graduate school he received a Robert Rauschenberg Change Inc. Work Grant and was accepted into the MacDowell Artists Colony. Moving to Chicago, he was represented by the Jan Cicero Gallery and later the Nancy Lurie Gallery. In Chicago, he was commissioned to create a free-standing painting on top of Navy Pier. He was selected to The CETA artists in residence program in Chicago. He was also represented by the Henri Gallery in Washington, DC. Neider moved to the East coast in 1980, where he has continued his painting practice. Neider has had two solo exhibitions in CT, a solo show in Bushwick, NY and a solo show in Montclair, NJ. He has been in group exhibitions including Galerie Kremers in Berlin, the 490 Atlantic Gallery, the Overlook Gallery in Chicago, IL, the Carter-Burden Gallery in Chelsea, NY, Equity Gallery, NY, Un. of WI, Lowe Museum, FL. Ten paintings titled Hot Loops were installed in five large windows at Saks Fifth Ave., Toronto. Neider was invited to the Cutlog Art Fair, NYC, 2014 and the Spring Break Art Fair, NYC, 2020. In 2002 he received a grant from the CT Commission on the Arts.

Supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Artist Talk: Kate Bae

Thursday, March 30, 6:00 PM. Free admission, no RSVP required.

You’re invited to a gallery talk with artist Kate Bae, who will discuss the current exhibition A Rite of Passage at Real Art Ways. Bae is a recipient of a 2021 Real Art Award.

Born in Busan, Korea, Kate Bae is a New York-based independent curator and artist working through painting and site-specific installations. Bae’s practice is concerned with multiple identities, memory, neuroses, and psychological borders. Bae holds an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in painting. Bae is a founder of Women’s Cactus for the Arts and has exhibited nationally and internationally, including solo shows at the Sunroom Project Space at Wave Hill, Bronx, NY and the Deiglan Gallery in Akureyri, Iceland. She is a grant recipient of a Real Art Award, MVP Chapter Lead Grant from Malikah Gender Justice Institute, Ora Lerman Trust, Creative Capital Professional Development Program and the NYFA Immigrant Artist Mentoring Program. She has attended many residencies including the Golden Foundation, the Studios at Mass MoCA, Trestle Gallery, Wassaic Project, Chashama and Lower East Side Printshop Keyholder Residency, among others.

Artist Talk: Howard el-Yasin

Thursday, March 9, 6:00 PM. Free admission, no RSVP required.

You’re invited to a gallery talk with artist Howard el-Yasin, in conversation with writer and curator Sarah Fritchey. el-Yasin and Fritchey will discuss the process and concepts behind the current exhibition Specific Matter at Real Art Ways.

Howard el-Yasin is a New Haven, CT-based interdisciplinary artist, curator and educator holding degrees from Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA ’16), Wesleyan University, and New England College. They have exhibited their artwork nationally, and have work in several private collections. They are currently an adjunct faculty member at MICA, and the co-founder/curator of SomethingProjects, an artist-run curatorial initiative. They were a recipient of MICA’s Leslie King-Hammond Award (2016) and the Faculty and Staff Queer Alliance Award (2015). They are a trustee of the Vermont Studio Center and a former VSC residency fellowship recipient (2012). el-Yasin has also served as a volunteer leader with numerous Connecticut-based non-profit organizations, including as Director/Curator of Arts Literature Laboratory (2002-2009).

Photo Credit: Steven Laschever

Sarah Fritchey is an independent Curator and Writer who works at the intersections of art, justice, civic engagement, memory and belonging. Fritchey served as the Curator at Artspace New Haven from 2014 to 2020, organizing group exhibitions, solo projects, and public programs that mobilized partnerships between long term and transient residents, local organizations, and major institutions. She has curated exhibitions across the country, including the African American Museum in Philadelphia, Lyman Allyn Art Museum (New London, CT), the Hessel Museum of Art (Annandale-on-Hudson, NY), Sideshow Gallery (NYC), Franklin Street Works (Stamford, CT), and Real Art Ways with the exhibition Statues Also Die. She has contributed writing to Artforum.com, Hyperallergic, Art New England Magazine, Big, Red & Shiny, Artscope Magazine, and the Hartford Courant. She serves as an organizer and advisor to Nasty Women Connecticut, and holds an M.A. in Curatorial Studies from the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard, and a B.A. in Comparative Literature and Studio Practice from Hamilton College, and is an alum of No Longer Empty’s Curatorial Lab.

Artist Talk: Rashmi Talpade

Friday, March 3, 6:00 PM. Free admission, no RSVP required.

You’re invited to a gallery talk with artist Rashmi Talpade, who will discuss her photo collage practice and the current exhibition Every Little Thing at Real Art Ways.

Rashmi Talpade is a professional artist with a Fine Arts degree from Mumbai, India, specializing in painting and photography. Since immigrating to Connecticut in 1991, she has been involved in the local arts community and has exhibited her work statewide, in New York, New Mexico and India. She is a recipient of an Artist Fellowship from the Connecticut Commission of the Arts and she has received numerous grants from the State of Connecticut and the National Endowment for the Arts to support her public art projects. These projects include works at the New Britain Museum of American Art, the Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, the five branches of the New Haven Public Library, the Wallingford Public Library, the Essex and Southington Elementary Schools, and the Bandra Municipal School in Mumbai, India. She also has upcoming projects at the New Britain Public Library and with the Spanish Community of Wallingford. Her photo collages are in the permanent collection of the New Britain Museum of Art and the Roopankar Museum of Modern Art, India.

Photo Credit: Steven Laschever

Creative Cocktail Hour

Live music, art exhibitions, food and drinks, and you. Come as you are!

Creative Cocktail Hour is about the people. Everybody is welcome, conversations abound, people connect.

Live Music:

La Banda Chuska:

La Banda Chuska are re-imagining the vintage sounds of Peruvian cumbia and surf through the lens of their New York City home and diverse musical and cultural backgrounds (Peru, PR, Argentina, USA). They take inspiration from the twangy 1960s surf bands of Lima (Los Belkings, Los Siderals) as well as the psychedelic flavors of 1970s chicha (Los Destellos, Los Orientales de Paramonga). Their post-punk energy and subversive playfulness have also evoked comparisons to a tropical version of the B-52s.

The band has been playing their dance-y and experimental tunes around NYC for three years, building up a loyal local following through a monthly residency at Brooklyn’s Barbès and opening for touring groups including Meridian Brothers and Son Rompe Pera. An NYC fixture, they’ve performed at the Brooklyn Museum to celebrate Latinx history month, as well as venues like the Sultan Room, TV Eye, and the SoundWaves Festival at White Feather Farm, among others. Internationally, they’ve toured in Mexico including an appearance at the popular international festival, Carnaval de Bahidorá.

They have self-released their debut EP vía streaming services and cassette and are finishing work on their debut LP. With Adele Fournet on keys/vocals, Felipe Wurst and Sam Day Harmet on guitars, Erica Mancini on accordion/vocals, Abe Pollack on bass, and Joel Mateo on drums.

For more information, check out their Instagram!

DJ Mr. Realistic

Art Exhibitions:

Alan Neider: Exhibition opening and reception at CCH

Karl Goulet: Exhibition opening and reception at CCH

Kate Bae: A Rite of Passage

Howard el-Yasin: Specific Matter

Food Truck

Munchers International: A Taste of Jamaica!

Hands-on Art Making Activities led by Real Art Ways Staff

& You!

Creative Cocktail Hour is about community and expression.

Buy your tickets online!

Riverwood Poetry Series

Join us for this in-person reading! Audience mask wearing is strongly encouraged, but not required.

Bring a poetry book–gently used, or new–to the book swap. If you bring a book, you may take a book. Start the new year with new reading!

The author’s books will be available to buy for book signing and conversation. Beer, wine, soft drinks, and snacks will be available for purchase.

April’s Poet:

January Gill O’Neil is an associate professor at Salem State University, and the author of Glitter Road (forthcoming, 2024) Rewilding (2018), Misery Islands (2014), and Underlife (2009). From 2012-2018, she was the executive director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival. Her poems and articles have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-A-Day series, American Poetry Review, Poetry, and Sierra magazine, among others. The recipient of fellowships from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Cave Canem, and the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, O’Neil was the 2019-2020 John and Renée Grisham Writer-in-Residence at the University of Mississippi. She currently serves as the 2022-2023 board chair of the Association of Writers and Writers Programs (AWP).