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COUNTERSPELLS &
CONCATENATIONS Marianne Connolly Rebecca Muller Thursday, September 4 through Saturday, September 27, 2025 Opening Reception Thursday, September 4, 5–7:00 pm Art Forum Online Thursday, September 18 at 7:30 pm |
CLICK BELOW TO SEE MORE
Image Gallery Video of Art Forum Marianne Connolly website / member page Rebecca Muller website / member page “Dialogue with the Artists” (See dates below) |
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Dialogue with the Artists at the Gallery
Rebecca Muller will be present: Friday, Sept. 5, 2-4:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 11, 2-4:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 13, 4:30-7:00 p.m. Friday, Sept. 19, 4:30-7:00 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 27 4:30-7:00 p.m. |
COUNTERSPELLS & CONCATENATIONS
AT GALLERY A3 IN SEPTEMBER
In Counterspells, Marianne Connolly works with intimately-scaled photography and hand-cut, hand-pasted collage, exploring familiar themes of nests, light, and winged beings while experimenting with new materials and methods. In Concatenations, Rebecca Muller exhibits several series of large-format photopolymer etchings and small groupings of mixed media assemblages composed of disparate matter and debris.
AT GALLERY A3 IN SEPTEMBER
In Counterspells, Marianne Connolly works with intimately-scaled photography and hand-cut, hand-pasted collage, exploring familiar themes of nests, light, and winged beings while experimenting with new materials and methods. In Concatenations, Rebecca Muller exhibits several series of large-format photopolymer etchings and small groupings of mixed media assemblages composed of disparate matter and debris.
MARIANNE CONNOLLY: Counterspells
As both a visual artist and a writer, Marianne Connolly finds that each type of work inspires the other. Her artwork in Counterspells is scaled to a page-size format and experiments with the juxtaposition of word and image. The collages are composed of visual elements that are snipped by hand from discarded books and magazines and then assembled into fantastical or surrealistic scenes, often presenting figures in the midst of transformation. The photographs are part of a series taken in autumn after the leaves have fallen, revealing nests previously hidden in the foliage. Some of these photographs of newly-revealed nests are printed on transparency paper and laid over the text of a story while others are hung in the light to capture and cast a shadowy image.
“This work isn't overtly political. It's not even overtly magical, although I sometimes tilt in that direction. But both personally and politically, making art is about countering fear, despair, and paralysis,” says Connolly. After suffering a critical illness in 2017, she still struggles with strength, coordination, and pain management. And in the actual physical endeavor of making art, she goes counter to her fears to reclaim something she almost lost. And, she notes, this year has been devastating for many people, economically and politically. “To be an artist in an age of repression is an act of stubborn, persistent passion,” she concludes.
Click for Marianne's Artist Statement
As both a visual artist and a writer, Marianne Connolly finds that each type of work inspires the other. Her artwork in Counterspells is scaled to a page-size format and experiments with the juxtaposition of word and image. The collages are composed of visual elements that are snipped by hand from discarded books and magazines and then assembled into fantastical or surrealistic scenes, often presenting figures in the midst of transformation. The photographs are part of a series taken in autumn after the leaves have fallen, revealing nests previously hidden in the foliage. Some of these photographs of newly-revealed nests are printed on transparency paper and laid over the text of a story while others are hung in the light to capture and cast a shadowy image.
“This work isn't overtly political. It's not even overtly magical, although I sometimes tilt in that direction. But both personally and politically, making art is about countering fear, despair, and paralysis,” says Connolly. After suffering a critical illness in 2017, she still struggles with strength, coordination, and pain management. And in the actual physical endeavor of making art, she goes counter to her fears to reclaim something she almost lost. And, she notes, this year has been devastating for many people, economically and politically. “To be an artist in an age of repression is an act of stubborn, persistent passion,” she concludes.
Click for Marianne's Artist Statement
"Daphne," hand-cut collage, Marianne Connolly
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From the "Rhizome" series, photopolymer etching from mixed media, Rebecca Muller
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REBECCA MULLER: Concatenations
Rebecca Muller approaches both printmaking and assemblage as a process artist, letting the material lead the way. Looking closely at what is often overlooked, there right in front of us, she collects bits and pieces of organic and inorganic debris—found artifacts that reflect both the physical and metaphysical cycle of erosion and decay. One new series may begin with a bundle of matter she collected on a single walk; a sequence of prints may build on or literally embody an intriguing element from an earlier etching. Across media and dimension, they emerge one from another, as a concatenation of initially disparate elements intentionally linked together—mapping experience as it unfolds before us.
That sense of intentional interlinking is essential. While the print series have titles--Rhizome series and Frail Structures—that serve as devices to orient the viewer, the work in essence investigates sequential imaging. “Often, they are layered with images from two or three other plates. What results is an ambiguity of space, shifting scale, and time passing before one’s eye with hieroglyphic messaging,” explains Muller. Comprised of component parts that allow variations in how the piece is presented, the individual images can be arranged in a vertical column or meander horizontally across a wall. “The scale orients us toward the standing or seated body and invites the eye to survey a ‘wall of work’ as if it were a bridge between an internal and external landscape,” says Muller.
Click fo Rebecca's Artist Statement
Rebecca Muller approaches both printmaking and assemblage as a process artist, letting the material lead the way. Looking closely at what is often overlooked, there right in front of us, she collects bits and pieces of organic and inorganic debris—found artifacts that reflect both the physical and metaphysical cycle of erosion and decay. One new series may begin with a bundle of matter she collected on a single walk; a sequence of prints may build on or literally embody an intriguing element from an earlier etching. Across media and dimension, they emerge one from another, as a concatenation of initially disparate elements intentionally linked together—mapping experience as it unfolds before us.
That sense of intentional interlinking is essential. While the print series have titles--Rhizome series and Frail Structures—that serve as devices to orient the viewer, the work in essence investigates sequential imaging. “Often, they are layered with images from two or three other plates. What results is an ambiguity of space, shifting scale, and time passing before one’s eye with hieroglyphic messaging,” explains Muller. Comprised of component parts that allow variations in how the piece is presented, the individual images can be arranged in a vertical column or meander horizontally across a wall. “The scale orients us toward the standing or seated body and invites the eye to survey a ‘wall of work’ as if it were a bridge between an internal and external landscape,” says Muller.
Click fo Rebecca's Artist Statement
ART FORUM ONLINE
In an Art Forum online at 7:30 pm on Thursday, September 18, join us for a conversation with Marianne Connolly and Rebecca Muller about the visual connections and conceptual cross-fertilization in their two-person exhibition.
The two artists, working with both written and visual art, bring together ideas, words, images, and concepts in their art. Connolly works with photographs, collage and speculative fictional writing. Muller creates etchings and mixed media "tableaus," referencing sequential art and "story coding" within her images. The audience is invited to engage in an evening of imagery, artist-participant dialogue and short "bonus" readings.
This Art for Community outreach program is supported in part by grants from the Amherst Cultural Council and the Pelham Cultural Council, local agencies, which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.
CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO OF SEPTEMBER'S ART FORUM
In an Art Forum online at 7:30 pm on Thursday, September 18, join us for a conversation with Marianne Connolly and Rebecca Muller about the visual connections and conceptual cross-fertilization in their two-person exhibition.
The two artists, working with both written and visual art, bring together ideas, words, images, and concepts in their art. Connolly works with photographs, collage and speculative fictional writing. Muller creates etchings and mixed media "tableaus," referencing sequential art and "story coding" within her images. The audience is invited to engage in an evening of imagery, artist-participant dialogue and short "bonus" readings.
This Art for Community outreach program is supported in part by grants from the Amherst Cultural Council and the Pelham Cultural Council, local agencies, which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.
CLICK HERE FOR VIDEO OF SEPTEMBER'S ART FORUM