Bob Dilworth is a mixed-media artist living in Providence and Professor of Art at the University of Rhode Island, Kingston. In addition to teaching painting, drawing, design, and African American Art History, he is also Director of Africana Studies. His current works on canvas, paper and textiles tackle issues of race, culture, ethnicity, family, heritage, and ancestry through metaphor and allegory as observed and portrayed through household prints and patterns. They employ an aesthetic gesture toward moments in history that run parallel to current times, often intersecting and exploring hidden and deeper meanings of his experience as an African American.
We asked him a few questions about his life and art-making in Rhode Island for our series, Rhode Island Cultural Anchors.
RISCA: Give us a brief overview of your day yesterday- what did you do in both your personal and professional life.
BD: Home neglect is the biggest issue these days. Because the entire house is now a working studio I’ve given up on keeping it clean. Maintenance centers on moving art material from one room to another. My vacuum cleaner has dust allergies, my broom has cobwebs and my dustpan eloped with a strange utensil that I’d been keeping under the kitchen sink.
RISCA: Why do you make Rhode Island your home, and how did you end up here?
BD: RI is the most go-to place on the east coast. Except for when you want a real NY hotdog.
RISCA: What is one thing, personal or professional, that you want to accomplish in the next year?
BD: A small voice in my head says, “Acquire lots of money, a big house by the Atlantic ocean, and plenty of rich friends who are not familiar with the word NO.” But a louder voice screams, “Don’t say that!!!”
RISCA: Why do you do what you do? What inspires you, drives you, to create or enable the creation of art?
BD: I do what I do because insanity, that often presents itself as an avant-garde Gertrude Stein wearing pink trousers and yellow ballet shoes, is the only alternative. Staying sane inspires me. I’m driven by having an anxiety-free life. I create because life is short and I still have so many more trousers and ballet shoes to make.
RISCA: What Rhode Island artists and/or arts organizations most inspire you and why?
BD: I’m inspired by anyone who likes sugar, shoes, soap, beer, fried foods and broccoli. I’m inspired by organizations that promote good posture and defend the rights of guinea pigs.
Meredith Stern is a ceramicist and printmaker living in Providence. She is a member of the international group The Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative. She is RISCA’s 2019 drawing & printmaking fellow.
beach and I fell in love with the salty air and the feel of the sand between my toes. I had been living in New Orleans for 7 years and there were no nearby places to swim in clean water. I was enthralled with the fact that we could get to the ocean in Rhode Island in less than one hour, so I decided to move in with my friends for a couple months. That visit turned into me now living her for 14 years.
highlight artists and hire administrators in our museums, galleries, and other cultural centers who reflects the diversity of perspectives of people living in our city of various ethnicities and genders. Another example is a custom that has been being adopted by cultural and educational institutions of land acknowledgements of the indigenous inhabitants of the land. I’ve seen this done in the University of Connecticut, and I’d like to see institutions in Rhode Island adopting this practice as well. There’s a lot of work to do to address systemic inequality, these are just a couple examples.
Libby Slader is the founder of Libby Slader Interior Design, Inc., an award winning design firm that specializes in hospitality and corporate office environments. She is also a Co-Founder of DESIGNxRI, a non-profit organization that promotes and galvanizes the design community in Rhode Island. Currently, she serves as the Chairman of the Rhode Island State Council of the Arts, a position she has held for 3 years.
Harrison Grigsby, aka Jon Hope, is a multidisciplinary hip hop artist and educator. He teaches at Roger Williams University, focusing on hip hop and urban culture and art, and the intersection with community development. He is the 2019 RISCA Fellow in Music Composition.
Elizabeth Duffy is a multidisciplinary artist whose current work explores the subject of incarceration and its intersection with domestic life. Her work is influenced by feminist art, interior decoration and craft, and the complicated ideals of home. She is the 2019 RISCA Fellow in Three Dimensional Art, and Merit Fellow in Craft.
love that space is affordable, so you can have a decent studio (with a window!) to make work. I came here from New York City 13 years ago, and I’ve felt the resources and engaged community here have really helped me find new directions in my work. I’m fascinated by the long history of making in Rhode Island, and the way those spaces and tools are being reused to make art. Anything feels possible in Rhode Island.
RISCA: Why do you do what you do? What inspires you, drives you, to create or enable the creation of art?
Chris Dalpe is the Communications and Events Manager at The Steel Yard by day (and also evenings and weekends) and super engaged in creating and supporting other creatives by night (and daytime and weekends). He’s been in Providence for five years, with no plans to ever leave.
happened. Yesterday specifically? I worked with a phenomenal local illustrator, Pitch Canker, finalizing the design for our Halloween Iron Pour Posters. After work, I scooted over to Cranston to Volunteer at AIDS Care Ocean State’s first Drag Queen Bingo of the season.
CD: AT THIS VERY MOMENT, the next big thing is The Steel Yard’s 13th Annual Halloween Iron Pour and it’s going to be spectacular. Over the past couple months I’ve watched nearly 30 volunteers fabricate larger than life dinosaur sculptures and seen our Studio Managers Ben & Michelle work with a phenomenal group of foundry artists. ALL OF THIS work leads to one spectacular, hot, and inspiring night that we play with fire (safely).
Veronica Mays began quilting in 2004, and got serious quilt fever in 2015. She is based in Portsmouth, RI and works to preserve African-American heritage and history, as well as her family’s history, through her quilts. She received a Project Grant for Individuals last year to create quilts celebrating African American history, as well as demonstrations, classes, and public showings of these pieces.
nap, which I regretted because I woke up at four in the morning – tossing and turning for an hour. I woke up and cooked three nights worth of dinner – baked chicken wings, steak and onions, a big pot of yellow eyed-beans, oven fries, broccoli, and fried monk fish. When I was done with these obligations, I returned to the love of my art life – quilting. I prepped three quilted post cards, created a Barack Obama quilt pattern, and continued to spread material all over the living room, two bedrooms, and the dining room table.
post cards, bottles and blooms, and accidental landscapes. However, the quilted post cards have taken on a life of their own.
Eric Bennett is a Providence based writer and Associate Professor of English at Providence College. He is this year’s fiction 
to band practice at the Wurks. On Tuesday night you can walk an even shorter distance to your writing group, comprised of brilliant, serious writers, meeting just off Dexter Field. On Wednesday night you can drive down to Cranston and drink a beer with Andy Davis at subModern Studios as he runs punk vocals through a wurlitzer and humors your affection for Bob Seger’s “Fire Lake.” On Friday, at Ada Books (also a short walk) you can browse comics drawn by locals, then head over to an opening at RISD or a play at The Players on Benefit Street. On Saturday afternoon you can chat with Mike Samos at Empire Guitar about what the band Geraldine’s up to. Do I sound like a promotional magazine? Who cares? This place is the best!
The Rhode Island State Council on the Arts (RISCA) is pleased to present works by artist Kate Wilson on exhibit through September 18, 2018 at the Block Island Airport Gallery. The Block Island Airport Gallery presents the work of contemporary Rhode Island artists in quarterly exhibitions.
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