Memories in watercolors

Detail from “Vida Vieja” (watercolor), in her show until Feb. 7 at the Hess Gallery of Pine Manor College, in Chestnut Hill, Mass.

This multimedia exhibit displays the artist's watercolor paintings in a video slideshow along with a voice-over from Correá. “Vida Vieja” is Spanish for "old life.’’ So her paintings depict her childhood in Colombia. Each painting is associated with a memory, which she discusses in her video slideshow. She describes going to church, grinding corn, playing outside and other nostalgic experiences. She admits, however, that her memory isn't perfect, represented by the use of watercolor. She explains, "Memory is not 100 percent accurate; with watercolor, I can portray my memories in an abstracted reality."

'Me, too' in the struggle

“Me, too’’ (oil), by Kat Masella, in the show “The Personal Is Political,’’ at the Hess Gallery, at Pine Manor College, Chestnut Hill, Mass., through Feb. 20. The show is named after a 1969 essay by Carol Hanisch. The gallery says: “Each piece tells a different story of female political and social struggle, with the underlying hope of inspiring others to do their own part in working towards equality.’’

Transcendental photography

 

Images by SARAH BILLOTA (top) and MOLLY LAMB in the show "Inventory of Reverie: 5 Women Photographers,'' at the Hess Gallery, Pine Manor College, Chestnut Hill, Mass.

Inside and out

"Mother in Her Apartment at Night'' and "Wind and Waves'' by Suzanne Hodes, in the Hess Gallery, at Pine Minor College, Chestnut Hill, Mass.

Meshing the gears of art

 

"Orange Twist'' (cast rubber), by NIHO KOZURU, in her show "Cast & Layered,'' at the Hess Gallery, Chestnut Hill, Mass., through Jan. 28.

The Boston sculptor says that she's inspired by the traditional and industrial architectural forms she sees around New England.

I know what she means. I come from a family background in which materials and engineering ruled our occupational lives. No one talked much about the "service economy.'' It was all about mining, growing, making and shipping real things, appreciating their practicality and, in passing,  even their beauty.

"What a beautiful machine!''

The gallery notes say  that Ms. Kozuru "pumps new life and vision into old forms in an approach that bends our understandings and conceptions of reality and form.''

Even the word "rubber'' seems old fashioned now, bespeaking a pre-plastics time, tropical colonies and yes, a quaint nickname for a male contraceptive. (It was better than the lining of a sheep's stomach.)

--- Robert Whitcomb

The layered effect

"Winter Painting','  by DAVID BARNES, in his show at the Hess Gallery at Pine Manor College, Chestnut Hill, Mass., through Jan. 20.

When I was a kid, I couldn't sleep in gleeful anticipation of  blizzards, which were particularly dramatic at our house on the top of a windy hill near the sea.  Now I still can't sleep but the snow seems like a blanket  of death.