| The Present Tense |

Last week, Big Red and Shiny, an arts journal that served as a staple in the Boston art scene for the last 6 years, launched their final issue. After providing our community a forum to challenge and create dialogue around the state of the arts in New England, Founder, Matt Nash decided to “close up [...]

Summer warms Boston as The Present Tense stretches it’s limbs and wipes hibernation from it’s eyes.  In our somnolence, visions of the future abound!  As of June 1 The Present Tense has moved on from MEME Gallery to explore new curatorial terrain.  We are also investigating our roles as creators, nestling into new bodies of [...]

From 2006-2009, The Present Tense operated primarily out of Fort Point and more specifically, Midway Studios. We had access to multiple spaces and were able to organize events without having to pay anything, something we took advantage as much as possible. 9 Events later, the spaces became occupied by companies and are no longer available [...]

In 2002, I saw “Juggling Gender,” a documentary on Jennifer Miller, a modern day bearded lady. Jennifer’s confidence, sultry voice, and overall spirit sent me spiraling into the depths of infatuation. From this moment on, I became intoxicated by the idea of growing my very own beard. Several chin hairs have emerged [...]

One of the most important things about curating for me, is to represent a spectrum of different kinds of work within a genre. Many times, this means challenging my own notion of what I think I know about art making, what defines a piece of work/artist, and where it falls into history. Ean White is [...]

Lucas Murgida created the first part of this piece for Contaminate II as part of his Locksmithing series.  The following text was given to the audience at the event:

“The Locksmithing Institute of Contaminate Lesson #7: Willful Disappearance
In lesson #7 the students of “The Locksmithing Institute of Contaminate” will be instructed in the ancient locksmithing technique [...]

We were not able to get anything posted last week, so to make up for it I’m giving you a trailer of the first Contaminate Festival.13 performances in under 3 minutes! Each one of these performances will eventually have their own edit and post, but I think its important to understand the context in witch [...]