Brian Slattery

Hamden

Arts and Culture Editor at New Haven Independent

Articles

33 Artists Go Plant-Based

2 days 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.
Shredded Beats

1 week 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.
Shredded Beats

1 week 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.
NHTC Measures The Uncertainty Of Romance

1 week 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.
Where New Haven's Recycling Goes

1 week 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.
Three Bands Light Up The History Of Ska

2 weeks 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.
I Loved You Until The Morning

3 weeks 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?
Emin Doesn't Flinch

3 weeks ago | newhavenindependent.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?
Tangled Bedsheets

4 weeks ago | midbrow.org | Brian Slattery

Lilah Heyman’s Friday Night (Nest) is a vivacious portrait of tangled bedsheets, but in its lavish attention to detail, it becomes a study of form as well — the wrinkles in the sheets, the way the light falls from crest to valley, become their own subject.
New Haven Paint And Clay Club Celebrates 125 Years

4 weeks ago | newhavenindependent.org | Brian Slattery

Alexander Bushnik’s Rhino with Teacups is whimsical enough that it’s easy to overlook the skill it must have taken to create it. But look again: How exactly does it stay together? Why doesn’t it tip right off the wall? The balancing act on display in the piece is mirrored in the walls around it, displaying portraits, landscapes, and abstract canvases that in some ways couldn’t be farther apart in style, but are brought together and made into a cohesive whole.