The Koussevitzky Art Gallery (theatre lobby near the box office) is open to the public and offers exhibits by professional artists from the U.S. and abroad. Several shows are mounted each semester. In addition, student art work is exhibited in the Koussevitzky lobby throughout the year.
Monday – Friday
9 a.m – 5 p.m.
Theatre lobby
From April 9 through May 9, the Koussevitzky will feature the work of artist Caren Kinne.
Caren Kinne was born and raised in the renowned Berkshires of Western Massachusetts. It is from here that she works in her bright and cozy studio in the heart of the dynamic artistic culture and scenic countryside of the area. Caren has shown her work in exhibits both nationally and internationally, and has won several art awards. As a child, Caren found entertainment in drawing and art making- whether designing her own fashion illustrations, inventing whimsical places and characters or crafting with the women in her family. Looking back, one can see the traces of these early influences, which in a way, have now come full circle — in both the playfulness and nostalgic elements of her work today. Caren holds a BFA in studio arts with a concentration in painting, and a master's degree in art education. Her work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally she and has won several art awards.
Caren Kinne's work explores themes of anemoia*, memory, nostalgia and utopia. Working with a variety of materials from colored pencils to printmaking and occasionally sculpture, her visual language conveys a whimsical overtone through use of bright colors and organic forms. Her two-dimensional works include purposefully ambiguous backgrounds, lending to a notion of anywhere and anywhen.
My Portrait Series is a large body of work composed of exuberantly whimsical abstractions, where color and organic forms prevail. By reflecting on personal moments and universal human experiences, these works draw the spectator into a fictitious and heartwarming universe that emerges bit by bit — one that feels both familiar and charmingly curious. The forms appear dreamlike, merging past and present. The figures do not represent single, identifiable objects, but instead allow for multifaceted interpretations based on the viewer's life experiences. Whether vintage television sets, aristocratic fruit, or quirky lanterns, the viewer's own sense of nostalgia is brought to light. These works invite the viewer to pause, reflect, reminisce, and imagine a new vision of both bygone eras and the future.
Several years ago, separately from my creative work, I began a family tree research project. Ultimately my interest in this crossed into my art-making by honing in on an Ancestral Portrait Series. The goal to explore my heritage by transforming historical data into visual representations. For this on-going project, I only focus on ancestors who passed before my lifetime, and using limited information — often just a name and a set of dates. Sometimes I discover details about the individual, such as their occupation or a war in which they fought, but more often, I work with fragments of information. This lack of detail only adds to the intrigue and creativity of the portraits, as I research the garb of each era. These portraits unfold through the combination of name, place, and traditional costume, reimagining lives lived and stories untold. Each figure silently asks the viewer to ponder the lives of those who came before us. The works presented here are from this body of work.
*Anemoia is a contemporary word coined by author John Koenig in his publication The
Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows meaning: "nostalgia for a time you've never known."
Koenig, J. (2021). The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. Simon and Schuster.
