Mark Guglielmo’s resume is as layered as his collages. A former rapper and hip-hop producer, known as Vesuveo, the audio-turned-visual artist and Northampton resident has a new series, Cuba in Transition: Narrative and Perspective, at the A.P.E. Ltd. Gallery.

Guglielmo first visited Cuba two years ago with a group of friends he met salsa dancing in Northampton. “I had such a profound experience down there, that I had to do something as an artist to share with the world what I was feeling,” says Guglielmo. He has since returned to Cuba twice, and is now ready to share his experiences through the form of photo-collages and interviews.

Guglielmo took the photographs and conducted the interviews in the series during seven weeks spent in the Pearl of the Antilles exploring Santiago de Cuba, Baracoa, Havana, Viñales, Cienfuegos, and Trinidad. “For me, Cubans are the real draw,” says Guglielmo of his experiences staying at casa particulars, or Cuban families’ homes, while visiting. “You have lots of real conversations with people in Cuba, real connecting. There is little to no barrier for strong human connection if you have the courage and Spanish to bridge the gap.”

Che, 54″ X 41″

To date, Guglielmo has completed 16 collages in this series, with plans to make more before his upcoming shows in Cuba this February. The materials for these collages, Guglielmo says, mainly came from simply walking the streets in Cuba. “I’m not interested in normal tourist activities. I go horseback riding in the Cuban outback. I search for the perfect mojito. I swim in underground caves. I watch the world go by from the back seat of a bici-taxi. I drink rum with strangers. I get great $1 haircuts.”

Escuela-Primaria, 69″ X 142″

Guglielmo used neither a computer or Photoshop in creating these collages. “I’m on the computer too much as it is. I do not want to be on it when I’m making art,” says Guglielmo of his need to disconnect. “I also really like the tactile, old-fashioned approach of putting my fingers on the work. There’s no barrier between me and the pieces. They’re really an extension of me, not something filtered through a computer. My process is very simple; a child could do it: just scissors, tape and 4×6″ photos.”

Guglielmo’s seeking simplicity is not as evident in his pieces of art, which are a complex mosaic of experience. Instead, he says his desire to come home and create his art in the Pioneer Valley after 15 years spent in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and New York reflects this interest.  “Ten years ago I moved up here, and I’ve never been happier,” he says. “This area has everything I want: nature, affordability, culture, music, diversity.”

Mark Guglielmo’s series Cuba In Transition: Narrative and Perspective is at the A.P.E. Ltd. Gallery June 1-25, with an opening reception on Friday June 9 from 5-9 p.m.

Mark Guglielmo–artist
Northampton, Massachusetts
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Top image Cuba_El-Coche-Verde_68″ x 94″, photos courtesy of Mark Gugliemo

The post Guglielmo in Transition appeared first on Take Magazine.

“My heroes have always been artists who reinvent themselves every few years,” says Brattleboro, Vermont artist Mutsu Crispin. “I love it when an artist goes through a transformation repeatedly. Picasso. Miles Davis. Someone who isn’t afraid to step out of their norm and become something new.“

Mutsu Crispin is also the pseudonym of John DiGeorge, a bouncing, 46-year-old dervish of an artist who is at times a costume designer, puppeteer, oneiric film instructor, filmmaker, choreographer, and, currently, a classic visual artist. Mostly though, Crispin is an explorer interested in transformation.

Mutsu Crispin | Photographed by David Nielsen

Crispin grew up in Marietta, Georgia, and then attended Harvard, where, he says, “they’d just hand you a camera and tell you to go make something.” After Harvard, Crispin moved to New York City, where he learned how to make movies, then to Brattleboro to begin work on Redbelly, a film written with his cousin Justin Allen. Redbelly is a freakishly old-world fairy tale, featuring a princess trapped in a stone tower, bereft of human contact. It also features a prince with an external glass stomach, born unable to use his mouth to speak, cry, or eat, who was captured by an opportunistic moonshiner who uses the glass stomach as a still.

“I’d been doing a lot of dream work,” Crispin explains. “I’d been delving deeply and consistently into my dream world. There were a lot of themes and images and interior dramas playing out in my dreams that a fairy tale would be an easy vehicle for. Redbelly (still in production) is very particular to Vermont, but not set in Vermont. It all grew out of the landscape. The stone tower. . .there’s stone walls everywhere. There’s also a monster in the movie. What’s the monster in the woods of Vermont? It’s a bear that carries winter in its belly. The prince gets stuck in his belly, and it’s the harshest winter imaginable. We filmed that sequence in a snowstorm in the White Mountains. The mythology is definitely grown out where we were when we conceived it.”

Redbelly Tower | Photographed by Mutsu Crispin

Crispin’s alternative project, Bouncy Ball Art, seems crafted by an entirely different artist. The series, which can be seen at the A.P.E. Ltd. Gallery in Northampton, Massachusetts March 8-April 2, is whimsical, bright, and playful. The constructions feature bouncy rubber balls pressed between plates of heavy plexiglass, then screwed together to hold them in place. The clue that links both pieces is an almost mythic reexamination of the fantastical aspects of childhood, never mind that the finished pieces look like massively constructed Hasbro Lite-Brite screen panels.

“There’s a lot of places these pieces go,” Crispin says. “The grids are pixelated. I grew up playing Atari, playing Nintendo. I was totally into video games—all those early video games like Super Mario Bros. All of these pieces are like the background of Zelda or Super Mario Bros. They’re also used to express the deepest impulses of things I’m exploring in my life.”

So where did the name Mutsu Crispin come from? DiGeorge used to spend summers working on a farm; he saw the words repeatedly on old apple crates, and they caught his imagination. “I’ve always felt a connection with Japanese words and filmmakers,” he explains. “I liked the juxtaposition of the Japanese word Mutsu with the English word Crispin. I came up with these two characters: Mutsu is an alien and Crispin is a monkey. They came together to form Mutsu Crispin, which is an apple, but also the name of my production company.

Sanctuary | Photographed by Mutsu Crispin

“I’ve always been caught by cultures where as an adult you name yourself,” he continues. “You go on a vision quest, and when you come back you name yourself. Sometimes at an art opening, someone will come up to me and ask, ‘Are you Mutsu Crispin?’ I really like that.”

Mutsu Crispin – multimedia artist
Brattleboro, Vermont
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Top photo Bugs, photographed by Mutsu Crispin.

Bouncy Ball Art can be seen at the A.P.E. gallery in Northampton Massachusetts, March 8-April 2, 2017.

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