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2 weeks ago | 
midbrow.org | Brian Slattery
In Our HandsCurated by nico w. okoroOrchid Gallery/ ConnCORP496 Newhall St. Through July 3The shot in Merik Goma’s photograph is cinematic, a bright light in a darkened room. You can’t see either of the people’s faces, but you don’t have to. The postures of their bodies, their heads close together, convey much of the emotion, as do the arms, interlocked. The hands seal the deal, their gentle, firm grip, offering comfort, support.
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2 weeks ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
In Our HandsCurated by nico w. okoroOrchid Gallery/ ConnCORP496 Newhall St. Through July 3The shot in Merik Goma’s photograph is cinematic, a bright light in a darkened room. You can’t see either of the people’s faces, but you don’t have to. The postures of their bodies, their heads close together, convey much of the emotion, as do the arms, interlocked. The hands seal the deal, their gentle, firm grip, offering comfort, support.
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3 weeks ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
While the president of Enstructure spoke of his company’s careful management of the huge salt piles along the shore of the Mill River at Chapel and East Streets, longtime environmental advocates described a different scene — one where permeable tarps ripped and flapped in the wind during storms, and where the salt ran into the river and sank into the soil.
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3 weeks ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
NosegayInstitute Library847 Chapel St.Through June 23Living Magic, by Maria Citarella, is mounted unobtrusively on the front wall of the gallery, looking — at first glance, from a distance — like an orderly triptych, a study in greens. But as you approach, the lines in the piece grow more complex, and the three panels take on dimension, until you can see that the panels aren’t of paint, but of mosses and lichens. The piece comes to life, nudging over its own borders.
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1 month ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
Takaat and Mountain MoversThree SheetsNew HavenMay 4, 2025Ahmoudou Madassane of Takaat finished a long flourish on his guitar, raw and lyrical at the same time. Mikey Coltun answered with a drone on bass, supportive and grounding. Souleymane Ibrahim played a long swell on drums. Having created a wide-open musical landscape, the trio proceeded to charge through it on a galloping rhythm.
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1 month ago | 
midbrow.org | Brian Slattery
Takaat and Mountain MoversThree SheetsNew HavenMay 4, 2025Ahmoudou Madassane of Takaat finished a long flourish on his guitar, raw and lyrical at the same time. Mikey Coltun answered with a drone on bass, supportive and grounding. Souleymane Ibrahim played a long swell on drums. Having created a wide-open musical landscape, the trio proceeded to charge through it on a galloping rhythm. The audience — a crowded room, with everyone standing close together — swayed as if hit by a wave, already in tune.
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1 month ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
Two people are in a train station. You’d think they’d be waiting for a train, but it turns out they’re not. It’s unclear what they’re waiting for. Moreover, something has happened before the play starts. The situation is already awkward. “It’s fine,” he says. “It’s not,” she says. “It’s just weird. I feel awful.” We don’t know what they’re talking about. “Were you supposed to be meeting him here?” he asks. “No. What gives you that impression?” she responds. “Nothing. Just,” he begins.
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1 month ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
Truck 148, part of the New Haven Public Works program’s fleet of vehicles, rounded a corner in Newhallville on a spring Tuesday morning. As happens every weekday in one neighborhood or another in New Haven, the truck and its three-person crew served as the first link in the chain of a system that delivers New Haven’s recyclables from curbsides across the city, to New Haven’s transfer station on Middletown Avenue in Fair Haven, to facilities in Berlin and WIllimantic, and beyond.
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1 month ago | 
newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery
NME the Illest, vocalist and hype man for the New London-based ska band the Hempsteadys, had a couple instructions for the crowd at the beginning of their set at the Cellar on Treadwell Saturday night. “Let’s go!” he said. “It’s more fun if you stand up. It’s way more fun if you move up,” closer to the stage, he said. He pointed at a few people in the audience. “You know,” he said, singling them out. “You know!” he said, pointing at another.
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1 month ago | 
midbrow.org | Brian Slattery
“Tracey Emin: I Loved You Until the Morning” Yale Center for British ArtThrough Aug. 10. The visceral style conveys everything, in all its contradictions and complexities. The figure is a woman on all fours, hair bedraggled, back arched. She’s in a position of extremity, but which extremity? It could be an excoriating portrait of the subjugation of women, or a portrait of exhaustion. It could also be a depiction of a woman in the throes of intense sexual pleasure. Which is it?
