New Bedford art scene is lively work in progress

October 18, 2006|Patricia Harris and David Lyon, Globe Correspondents

NEW BEDFORD -- There's no telling what's going to pop up next in the art galleries here. The featured exhibit could be vintage motorcycles, pointillist renderings of landmark buildings, or a fisherman's photographs of life at sea. The only predictable thing about the New Bedford art scene is that it will probably confound expectations.

The galleries, in effect, are a barometer of a community on the ascendancy.

``I thought I'd never return to New Bedford," admits mixed-media artist Lasse Antonsen , who decamped to Providence in favor of better schools for his children and a more supportive environment for his art. But now he's back. ``Twelve or 15 years ago I saw New Bedford just going downhill. Now there's so much energy, so much going on."

Antonsen is director of the University Art Gallery on the Star Store campus of the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth . The gallery closes a show of 1960s paintings by surrealist Robert Beauchamp Saturday and opens an exhibition of artists' books on Oct. 26. When the College of Performing & Visual Arts transformed the defunct downtown-anchor department store into a state-of-the-art campus in 2001, many in New Bedford saw it as a turning point in the downtown's revitalization. Five years later, it seems they were right.

``A lot of students have stayed and they take a very active role in New Bedford's cultural life and in its politics, especially issues of preservation," Antonsen says.

Like Boston's Fort Point Channel district, New Bedford is full of old brick industrial buildings that make terrific studio spaces. There's no firm number on how many artists now call the city home, but more than 80 participated in the annual open studios event a few weeks ago. Many artists also welcome studio visits by appointment. (For information, see newbedfordopenstudios.org ). The gallery at the community arts center ArtWorks! is featuring a sampler exhibition of participating artists through October.

ArtWorks! is a regular participant in the monthly cultural celebration known as AHA! Night , which has taken place on the second Thursday of every month since July 1999. Each evening packs in a dizzying array that can range from outdoor jazz concerts to walking tours, museum nights, gallery shows, dance performances, history lectures, or even visits to ongoing redevelopment projects in historic buildings.