Empathy is a squishy concept. Most people like to think they have it, yet it’s nearly impossible to understand what another person feels, particularly someone from a different culture. Still, sometimes art can deliver that vicarious experience on a deep level. And the artists who transport others to a state of genuine empathy are often called visionaries.... Read more

Vermont co-op and natural-food store managers like to tout their localvore cred. They talk about how much local food they buy and the extent to which they accommodate regional organic growers.... Read more

Ceija Stojka cannot forget her traumatic childhood; as an artist, she has reason to remember. A touring exhibit of her paintings, currently at the West Branch Gallery, illustrates the horror of her early years.... Read more

The most popular place in Hardwick these days is not the pizza place, the bookstore or even Claire’s Restaurant. The numero uno venue is a hole-in-the-wall cellphone store. Tiny school kids, pimply teenagers, stressed-out adults — I’ve seen them all there, begging for Blackberries and the like. It’s the first thing every kid with cheapskate parents saves up for, and the last thing anyone over 12 wants to live without.... Read more

The nude female figure is an iconic subject in Western art. It’s right up there with landscapes, portraits of patrons and captains of industry, still lifes of flowers and fruit, and genre painting.

As Warren-based painter Billy Brauer puts it, “Some people like mountains; some people like covered bridges. I think women are beautiful.”... Read more

It’s a familiar scenario: Talented student mentored by world-renowned artist launches promising career and then has children. End of story.

Or is it? For most women in the arts, particularly women of a certain age, motherhood has a tendency to insert itself between talent and mastery. Some give up the creative pursuit altogether.... Read more

Think “classical music conductor,” and the image of a young, beautiful, hip female doesn’t typically spring to mind. But that aptly describes Alondra de la Parra, the 27-year-old founder of the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Americas. She is a rare commodity in the world of classical conductors simply by virtue of her sex. And she’s a conductor Vermonters will be able to see in action this week at the Festival of the Americas in Stowe.... Read more

Most potters stick with a formula: They choose a clay type, a firing technique and a vessel shape, and crank out production pieces to sell in the craft market.

To describe the late Vermont artist Charlotte Potok as merely a potter is to sell her short. Yet that’s how she saw herself.... Read more

You don’t have to understand Japanese culture, let alone the language, to appreciate the abstract beauty and power of brush painting. It needs no translation, perhaps because it’s the highest form of artistic expression in Zen Buddhism.... Read more

Claes Oldenburg first met Patty Mucha in an art-supply store in New York City. The two had separately gravitated there from the Midwest: he was a Swede who had recently obtained American citizenship; she was a Milwaukee girl of Polish extraction. They struck up a friendship that eventually led to marriage — 50 years ago — and a series of collaborations that helped make Oldenburg a household name.... Read more