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upcoming exhibitions

Cardboard Institute of Technology presents
Cardburg 2012: The Super Track
June 14 - August 12, 2012

Cardboard Institute of Technology (CIT) is a team of artists who use recycled cardboard to create enormous site-specific installations. CIT will transform the Bedford Gallery into Cardburg 2012: The Super Track, a miniature speedway for racing high speed remote controlled art cars, as well as a low-powered interactive micro radio station. CIT will host incredible opening and closing events including live music and FM broadcasted soundscapes, and live video feeds from in-car cameras. CIT will explore the high-octane culture of speeding vehicles translated into cardboard.

Do not miss this one-time show!

Curriculum Connection: Explore how artists transform the ordinary medium of cardboard and discuss the logistics of site-specific art installation.

Art Project: Create a cardboard race car sculpture with wheels, windows, flames and decals.


Captured: Specimens in Contemporary Art
September 4 - November 18, 2012

The intersection of art and nature has inspired artists for centuries. Artists have looked to the natural world as a source book for creative projects and strategies. From Impressionist plein air painting, to medieval bestiaries art has been committed to exploring the unfamiliar and unknown creatures and environments that share our world. Artists in this show will illustrate how a complex and rewarding dialogue between the arts, scientific exploration, and organic, found materials has been staged in a contemporary context.

Looking to traditions as diverse as taxidermy, specimen boxes, and the cabinet of curiosities, this exhibition will address the changing nature of our relationship with the natural world. It will offer us a glimpse into the impermanence and vitality of wildlife and the botanical world, encouraging us to question our assumptions about the curious world of unique and unusual creatures around us.


Jo Whaley, Smerinthus saliceti, mixed media.


Broadway Revealed: Behind the Theater Curtain
December 6, 2012 - February 17, 2013

Bringing the breadth, ambition, and showmanship of New York's iconic theater district to Walnut Creek, Broadway Revealed will offer viewers a behind the scenes look at world-class theater production. Featuring artist Stephen Joseph's photographs of some of Broadway's most critically acclaimed productions alongside theatrical props, costumes, and other artifacts, this exhibition showcases the complex support network of design, lighting, directing, and staging that come together to create the magic world of the theater. Joseph's composite, 360 degree photographs allow us to uncover the hidden heroes responsible for the dramatic flare and beautiful staging that has made Broadway an global leader in theater.

After opening at the Bedford, Broadway Revealed will travel to theater and cultural centers across the United States. Contact our traveling exhibitions coordinator for more information on renting this exhibition.


Stephen Joseph, American Idiot Tech Crew, photograph.


Peaceable Kingdom: Animals, Real and Imagined
March 3 - May 19, 2013

A juried show devoted to investigating our storied and rich relationship with the animal world, Peaceable Kingdom will invite prominent curators to assemble a collection of innovative and appealing works by national artists. This exhibition will explore the presence of animals in the visual arts, and how they appear as metaphors, totems, objects of fear, and sources of emotional attachment and affection. The history of human and animal interaction is filled with tales of failed domestication, unusual friendships, and fearsome predators. Human fascination with the animal kingdom has run the gamut from emotional connection, to economic exploitation, and even scientific curiosity. Throughout all of these interactions, however, the sense of wonder we feel when we encounter animal life has been an enduring theme that has informed their continued and abiding presence in the visual arts. This juried exhibition will encourage artists to meditate on these complex and diverse relationships, addressing such issues as antagonism, admiration, attachment, and even the politically charged issue of animal rights.

Stay tuned for entry details.


Tiffany Bozic, Traveling Light, 2009, acrylic on mapel panel.


Larger Than Life: Exploring Scale in Contemporary Art
June 2 - August 18, 2013

Since the Egyptians, art has played with the limits of its medium, stretching its size and scope to unfamiliar and unbelievable proportions. From the Great Sphinx of Giza, to Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel, artists have realized large-scale projects that have pushed the dimensions of their work to new and spectacular heights (and lengths!) Larger Than Life will explore how contemporary artists have begun to use new materials and technologies to reshape the traditional scale of painting, sculpture, and photography. Recently, artists have focused of unfamiliar materials and methods of construction, using these elements to investigate the oversized, overstuffed, and uncanny elements in art. This exhibition will encourage viewers to reconsider what they have come to know about the role of art, and the way in which subjects and themes can be represented.


Elisabeth Higgins O'Connor, No-name (detritus foot), 2009, blankets, knit Afghans, pillows, mattress covers, couch cushions, negligee, thread, twine, 7' x 3' x 4'.