ART! Bob Dillworth at Newport Art Museum. 1 of 3 to receive multi-year RISCA grants

The work of Bob Dillworth is on exhibit at the Newport Art Gallery where it will continue through the end of December. The solo exhibition is named “Backyard”, and features over 20 large-scale recent paintings by Dilworth including Bear Witness, which was acquired into the RISD Museum Collection this year. 

Bob Dilworth is a Providence-based artist who works in many different media to explore issues of identity, community, and place. Throughout his career, he has created works of art that are as richly layered with materials as they are with meanings. In his own words:

“My paintings, textiles, and works on paper tackle issues of race, culture, ethnicity, family, myths, folktales, and religious beliefs through metaphor and allegory. They employ an aesthetic gesture towards moments in history that run parallel to current times, often intersecting and exploring hidden and deeper meanings of my experience as an African American male. My current work examines the identity of friends and family and explores notions of home, heritage, ancestry, and generational change. This examination of friends and family members is also seen in decorative patterns, designs, and bric-a-brac; executed in oil and acrylic paint, spray paint, stencil, paint markers, inks, or glued, stitched and sewn onto fabric, paper and other surfaces.”

From lush wild landscapes to portraits filled with floral motifs, “Backyard” draws on the memories and experiences from the artist’s life in Providence and home of Lawrenceville, fifty miles south of Richmond, Virginia. This exhibition features past works of art, as well as new ones being shown for the first time.

About the Artist:

Bob Dilworth is a Professor Emeritus from University of Rhode Island where he taught painting and served as Chair and Director of the Main Art Gallery and Director of Africana Studies. He has also taught at Princeton University, Brown University, and Columbia College in Chicago. Dilworth received his BFA and MFA at the Rhode Island School of Design and School of the Art Institute of Chicago respectively. He has exhibited his work extensively and has received grants, awards, and residencies from the Rhode Island State Council for the Arts, Iris Project Residency, National John Biggers Award, Playa Artist Residency, and Anderson Ranch Art Center among others.

Nationally recognized and exhibited, Bob Dilworth’s works have won many awards including the 2014 Rhode Island State Council for the Arts Fellowship in painting, and also grants from the Rhode Island Foundation; University of Rhode Island Center for the Humanities; University of Rhode Island Council for Research; National John Biggers Award in drawing; and the Virginia Commission for the Arts. He has received fellowships from the Iris Project Residency; Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts; Angels Gate Cultural Center in association with Marymount California University; Playa Artist Residency; Anderson Ranch Art Center; Hambidge Center for Creative Arts and Sciences; the Klaus Center for the Arts; Contemporary Artist Center; the African American Master Artist in Residence Program, Northeastern University; and Le Cité International des Artes, Artist Residency in Paris. His work is in corporate and private collections, as well as many Chicago libraries and public institutions. Bob Dilworth is represented by Cade Tompkins projects.

To read more and view a selection of Bob’s show and learn about museum hours and events, please visit Newport Art Museum website.

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Dillworth is one of the 3 Rhode Island artists recently announced who will receive Multi-Year Arts Grants of $6,000 a year for 3 years.

In addition to Dillworth, Aleksandra “Sasha” Azbel, Bob Dilworth and Edwige Charlot have been chosen to receive 3 year arts grants by RISCA.

Multi-Year Arts Grant Awarded to 3 R.I. Artists

Recipients of the grant, General Operating Support for Artists, will receive support for large, specific, self-identified projects in their art practice. Additionally, the program includes a cohort, which offers support, enrichment and community-based opportunities. The program requires that participants submit a report once per year and remain R.I. residents for the full three years. 

In making the announcement RISCA’s Executive Director Lynne McCormack said, “We developed this three-year grant program, now in its second year, to enable artists to focus on their artmaking. The program continues our effort to update our grantmaking to align more closely with the needs of the arts community and our values of diversity, equity and inclusion.”

Official bios (provided by the artists):

Aleksandra “Sasha” Azbel is the founder and creative director of Sashoonya, a textile art and design company, specializing in sustainable textile products using local materials and dyes derived from nature. An immigrant from Kazakhstan, Sasha studied architecture at Texas A&M and RISD and teaches part time in the architecture department at Roger Williams University. In 2019, Sasha received a Fulbright to explore natural dyes in Sri Lanka, while her time there was cut short by a global pandemic, she used her new creative momentum to bring her natural dye passion back to Rhode Island, a place she loves to call home.

While in school she traveled and witnessed artisan communities in central America and Asia using non-toxic colors derived from locally sourced plants. She noticed a direct connection between the land, the textiles, and the people. This link carries with it a deep spirit, a pride of home and material culture. Azbel believes this connection to nature brings us a sense of completeness, a sense of belonging, and even a sense of beauty. Can we too, reclaim that connection and spirit? Can we bring back the textile industry in a way that is sensitive, regenerative, and expressive of our landscapes and our sensibilities?

To seek out the answers to those questions, and to prove their depth and strength, in 2021, Sasha founded Sashoonya, based in Nicholson File Arts complex, Providence. When not in the studio, she can be found farming, salsa dancing and mentoring at a local girl’s school, Sophia Academy.

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Edwige Charlot is a French-born Haitian immigrant artist and designer. As a descendant of Ayiti, Charlot’s work explores the complexities, tensions, and challenges of the indigenization process in the Caribbean and Creole contexts, using nature-based motifs. In their transdisciplinary practice, Charlot questions, reflects, and represents the relationships between people, land and culture. They employ installation, sculpture, craft, collage and printmaking to present a visual lexical language. 

Charlot’s work has received support from various organizations, including RISCA, the Andy Warhol Foundation through the Interlace Grant Fund, the St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist Award, the Maine Arts Commission and the Parent Residency Fellowship from the Sustainable Arts Foundation. They earned their BFA in Printmaking from the Maine College of Art and Design. Their work has been exhibited at the Maine Jewish Museum, Endicott College, Amherst College and the Fruitlands Museum. Charlot has been an artist in residence at BOOM Concepts in Pittsburgh, the Wedding Cake House and Queer.Archive.Work [queer.archive.work] in Providence, Tides Institute & Museum of Art in Eastport, Maine, and the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, Vt.  Charlot’s work has been exhibited in New England, New Jersey and New York, most recently in the New England Triennial 2022. Charlot resides in Providence, with their child and partner.

General Operating Support for Artists grant program provides support for artists to work toward larger, self-identified goals in their art practice. This funding is unrestricted, meaning artists can use the funds to support their goals however they need. This program includes a cohort community of current grantees, with meetings and learning opportunities. The grant program will open for applications on May 1, 2024. Read more about the program. 

About RISCA

The Rhode Island State Council on the Arts is a state agency supported by appropriations from the Rhode Island General Assembly and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. RISCA provides grants, technical assistance and staff support to arts organizations and artists, schools, community centers, social service organizations and local governments to bring the arts into the lives of Rhode Islanders.