About the Artists

Tim Rollins and Kids of Survival (K.O.S.)

Tim Rollins, born in Pittsfield, Maine, received a BFA from New York's School of Visual Arts. A conceptual artist who co-founded the artists' collective Group Material in 1979, he was also a special education teacher in Public School 52 in the South Bronx. He discovered that his students responded to visual and literary art, although many thought they would not be capable of understanding complex concepts such as in Shakespeare or Kafka. As a result, in 1982 Tim established the Art of Knowledge Workshops series for students with learning disabilities and then K.O.S., which stands for "Kids of Survival," the name the students chose for themselves. Tim continues to mentor internationally students of all abilities and also is the resident professor of art and education at Drexel University, Philadelphia.

Tim Rollins and K.O.S. have completed conceptual art projects that combine literary texts and painted images from Albany, New York to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from Mexico City, Mexico to Munich, Germany. Subjects they have explored include Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Martin Luther King's I See the Promised Land, Franz Kafka's Amerika, and Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Their work has been shown throughout the world and is in many museum collections including Williams College Museum of Art and the University of Virginia Art Museum.

Emily Cheng

Emily Cheng has a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) and has studied at the New York Studio School. She currently teaches Asian art history at the School of Visual Arts, New York, and junior painting at RISD. She is the recipient of fellowships from the New york Foundation of the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Emily has completed an artist residency at Yaddo, Saratoga Springs, New York. Emily has had solo shows at museums and galleries in the United States and internationally.

Timothy Basil Ering

Timothy Basil Ering, born in Rodchester, Michigan, moved to Cape Cod when he was three. After high school, he joined the US Navy and served from 1984 to 1990. In 1990, he was accepted into the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California and graduated with a BFA in illustration in 1994. Tim started off his art career as a professional illustrator in California, crerating art for magazines, newspapers, and music video companies. In 1996 he moved back to Cape Cod and had his first gallery exhibition at the Provincetown Group Galery. He then packed his sea bag for a 5-month sailing adventure through the Caribbean with his father, during which he completed his first illustrated book The Diary of Victor Fankenstein, released fall of 1997. Tim's first pop-up children's picture book, Sad Doggy was released in 2001. He became a highly praised author and illustrator when his picture book The Story of Frog Belly Rat Bone was released by Candlewick Press in 2003, the same year he illustrated Kate DiCamillo's The Tale of Despereaux (wich won the Newberry Medal in 2004).His most recent illustrated picture book by Deborah Blumentahl, Don't Let the Peas Touch, was released in falll 2004.

Magic Gardens

March 31 - September 5, 2005

This is the garden of make-believe,
A magical garden of make-believe.
Where flowers chuckle and birds play tricks
And a magic tree grows lollipop sticks.

Lyrics from the title song of The Magic Garden, a children’s television program (late 1970s-early 1980s)

Throughout the ages, artists have created images of magic gardens. Some are illustrations of make-believe places in which flowers come alive or have supernatural powers. Others are views of real spaces where plants produce interesting patterns and walkways such as a maze or a topiary garden, or a colorful flower and vegetable patch. The Kidspace Magic Garden features vibrant paintings by two individual artists and an artist group, each imagining various ways of using flowers and gardens for their magical properties.

In March 2005, conceptual artists Tim Rollins and K.O.S. (Kids of Survival) of New York City worked with the 4th - 8th grade students in the North Berkshire School Union to create flower paintings based on William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The students designed their own art works based on their responses to the special flower used by the play’s mischievous character Puck. The liquid from this flower when placed on an individual’s eyelid causes this person to fall in love with the next living creature encountered. The student art works were overlaid on text from Shakespeare’s play, linking the beauty of the written word with the magic of painted flowers.

Children’s book illustrator Timothy Basil Ering of Somerville, MA shares with us his interest in the storytelling property of flowers. Twenty-four original illustrations from his popular picture book The Story of Frog Belly Rat Bone are included in the exhibit. In this story, Ering tells how a young boy lives in a dark, despairing place called “Cementland,” until the monster Frog Belly comes to life to help him build-through hope, perseverance, and a watchful eye-a colorful flower garden. Magic Gardens also includes a series of lush, mixed media flower paintings Ering specifically created for Kidspace.

Painter Emily Cheng of New York City shows us how nature’s seasons affect the color and pattern of flowers in her large-scale paintings. Cheng’s work is also influenced by various eastern and western cultures. She incorporates multiple styles from various periods within a single work of art. For example, in one flower painting Cheng might include elements of a European Renaissance style and others from a distant era of Chinese painting. While her work does not necessarily illustrate a specific story, it can be read for symbolic, cultural, and historic information on flowers.

Magic Gardens was organized by Kidspace Director of Exhibitions and Education Laura Thompson with Kidspace Assistant Angela Roberts, and Artists Tim Rollins, Timothy Basil Ering, and Emily Cheng. Special thanks to the MASS MoCA Staff for their continued significant role in planning, promoting, designing, and installing the exhibition.