Of course, most of the works here resist collective characterizing. Ayumi Ishii’s 10 Minutes(of exhalation) is a cloud-white asteroid belt of suspended fist-size blobs, an engaging physical presence as well as a clever concept. Kerry St. Laurent’s Rocky Mountain Meadow is more interesting than a literal rendering would be, incorporating not only dense, green pine tree shapes but also sinuous concentric lines referencing topological maps. Turning an unpleasant annoyed observation into a pleasing visual one, Timothy Ohlinger came up with the chiaroscuro study Light Pollution on College Hill. In the nearly monochromatic oil on canvas, a suffused sky glows above a river, a foreground telephone pole rescuing the image from simple prettiness.
A single, short video represents that popular medium and does so well. In Matthew Mosher’s Release/Control, the opening text explains that two chairs are being filmed at the shoreline, one chained down and one not. The prelude’s concluding “this is their story” lightens the mood. Side-by-side images show the water rising until, in the same instant, one wooden chair is submerged and one floats out of frame. Time and tide, and all that.
Nothing in “30 Under 30” is facile, pretentious, or merely psychologically decorative, and certainly not visually so. Submitted from artists in New York and New England, these works are encouraging indications that the future of the art scene is looking bright.
Related:
Act natural, Inside looking out, Sculpting with paper, More 
- Act natural
Bruce Chao is traversing a 100-foot-long path of ludicrously narrow wooden girders that he’s lashed into tree branches 50 above a forest floor.
- Inside looking out
Visiting Elizabeth King's "The Sizes of Things In the Mind's Eye" at Brown University's Bell Gallery (64 College Street, Providence, through December 21) is a bit like visiting Dr. Frankenstein's lab — all glass eyes, artificial limbs, and automatons.
- Sculpting with paper
One of the preeminent issues of art — and, well, everything these days — is the how technology is changing our lives, making everywhere we go begin to feel like a synthetic, artificially-flavored SimCity.
- Dark and light sides of pleasure
"I want to create a place where people can take a little vacation from reality," Brooklyn artist Kirsten Hassenfeld has said. "I'm interested in going to a place where there is no want, only endless plenty." In "Recent Sculpture," her exhibit at Brown University's Bell Gallery (64 College Street, Providence, through November 1), she succeeds magnificently.
- Big Red
“Views and Re-Views: Soviet Political Posters and Cartoons” is one of the best exhibits you’ll see in New England this year.
- Unfettered farce
Farce is designed for more than pleasant laughter and fingertips-to-palm applause. In celebration of that, an all-stops-out production of Molière’s Tartuffe is being staged at Brown University Theatre (through October 4), and it gets the audience to put the roar in uproarious.
- Media rebels in the Internet age
Bloggers have “used a new and powerful medium and ‘crashed the gates’ to ensure that information — the most important ingredient in a democracy — would be available to anyone who wanted to write, read, or debate.”
- Second time around
If you are thinking of going back to school, you will want to do four things before making that commitment.
- Fact and fantasy
Walid Raad’s installation feels like a Borgesian detective story in which truth is elusive, and cities themselves shiver with post-traumatic stress disorder.
- Rhode Island at a crossroads
Among the hundred young people at a recent State House rally was a 17-year-old high school student, who could find himself in one of two places — either in college or homeless — a year from now.
- Land and water
As New Englanders know, sights and impressions are endless wherever land and water meet.
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Topics:
Museum And Gallery
, Painting, Visual Arts, Brown University, More
, Painting, Visual Arts, Brown University, Ria Brodell, Duane Hanson, Jo-Ann Conklin, Millee Tibbs, Less
