Welcome composer; indie rock, folk, and 20th-century minimalism-inspired, Christian Camarao, to In-Focus Podcast Number 135. A New Bedford native, Chris also works as an elementary school teacher. His works largely focus on specific geographic regions.

Christian talks with The Artist Index performing artists host, Jeff Angeley, about his background, music, travels, and lots more. This episode was recorded in Jeff’s recording studio in 2023.

The In-Focus Podcasts are up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of the remarkable creative community of South Coast Massachusetts including New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Westport, and beyond.

Welcome performing artist; ambient folk-blues, indie rock, ambient, folk, blues indie rock singer/songwriter guitarist, John Fernandes, to In-Focus Podcast Number 134. A New Bedford native, John performs solo throughout the south coast area.

He is also the guitarist for Molly O’Leary (Podcast Episode 124)and the J. Kelley Band. He also teaches guitar in the area at Double Bar Music in nearby Westport, Massachusetts.

John talks with The Artist Index performing artists host, Scott Bishop, about his background, music, travels, and lots more.

Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works, or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!

Welcome, Kyle DeCiccio-Carey to In-Focus Podcast Number 132! Kyle is the Library Director at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, and speaks with us about celebrated Fairhaven resident and painter Lemuel D. Eldred.

This is the second of five, Fairhaven Cultural Council grant-supported podcasts with Kyle who will be telling us about some of the town’s artists from days gone by. Lemuel Eldred is a great artist to begin this mini-series of podcasts!

William Bradford was born in Fairhaven in 1823. He developed an interest in painting as a young man and taught himself to draw by copying drawings from a book of illustrations repeatedly. In the early 1850s, he started his own clothing retail store in New Bedford. However, his art distracted him from his business which eventually failed.

He took lessons with Albertus van Beest, a Dutch painter living in New Bedford, and set up a studio on Union Street in Fairhaven. After a small success in selling paintings of boats, he opened a studio in Boston.

Bradford had been inspired to visit the Arctic and after he found success in Boston he was able to finance several trips to Labrador in the 1860s. In 1869, he went further north along Greenland taking photographers with him.

In 1873, he published an account of the voyage using photographs to illustrate the volume. He would use the photographs of the seascapes taken in the Arctic as a guide to creating paintings. He noted that despite the power of the camera to photograph the terrain, the “glorious phases of color remain unexpressed” until he painted what the camera had captured.

His work may be seen at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA, and Harvard University’s Art Museum.

The Artists Index podcasts are part of the continuing history of the area’s art and culture. The podcasts are a record of this creative community’s artists. They are an excellent resource for everyone; artists, art educators, art industry professionals, scholars, genealogists, and, non-artists as well.

Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Welcome, Kyle DeCiccio-Carey to In-Focus Podcast Number 132! Kyle is the Library Director at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, and will be speaking with us about celebrated Fairhaven resident and painter Lemuel D. Eldred.

This is the first of five, Fairhaven Cultural Council grant-supported podcasts with Kyle who will be telling us about some of the town’s artists from days gone by. Lemuel Eldred is a great artist to begin this mini-series of podcasts!

Lemuel was born and raised in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. The town shares the harbor with New Bedford. He was a marine painter and etcher and had studied with another outstanding Fairhaven painter, William Bradford, and for a short time, at the Academie Julian in Paris (1880).

Eldred’s work is typical of the late Hudson River School. He moved to Boston in 1876 to establish a studio. Lemuel Eldred was a sought-after and quite popular marine painter. He much enjoyed Bradford’s Quaker beliefs and manner but did not join Bradford in his exploratory polar expeditions.

His work may be seen in Fairhaven Town Hall, The Millicent Library, the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the Kendall Whaling Museum.

The Artists Index Website Project features the In-Focus Podcasts – up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community.

Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!

Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Welcome painter/muralist/art instructor, and production artist on Loving Vincent, Katherine “Kat” Knutsen to In-Focus Podcast Number 131! Kat was our guest on In-Focus Podcast Number 73.

This time, she’s speaking with our intrepid Indie Music Host – Scott Bishop about her musical side! Since childhood, Kat has always loved working with her hands.

Kat Knutsen survived asthma and brain cancer growing up, which initially led to her nursing studies. She quickly learned it wasn’t for her during the clinical portion of her education.

While leaving the nursing field, she was serendipitously introduced to the Fine Arts by a friend in sociology class. Kat says, “What drew me to this field was the impact of seeing my soon-to-be painting professor turn magic into a rational process. Something in me lit up!”

Kat decided to learn about art and to teach others ways to engage with the art-making process. Her art is now about, “reflecting and interpreting events around me.”

Listen in on this conversation as The Artist Index’s Indie Music Host – Scott Bishop delves more into Kat’s musical life, work, and future ambitions. 

The In-Focus Podcasts offer you up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community. Join us as we speak with and listen to the creative community’s living visual, performing, and literary artists.

Music courtesy of Scott Bishop

Welcome performing artist; award-winning composer, producer, musician, sound engineer, and visual artist/designer, Ryan Rooney, to In-Focus Podcast Number 130. Ryan has lived in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts since 2022.

He was born in Germany and has lived in Austin, Texas, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Lockhart, Texas, and Marfa, Texas.

Ryan talks with The Artist Index performing artists host, Scott Bishop, about his background, hometown, music, travels, and lots more. This episode was recorded in Scott’s recording studio in 2022. Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

The Artists Index Website Project features the In-Focus Podcasts – up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community.

Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works, or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!

Welcome performing artist; vocalist, songwriter, and music and culture educator, Candida Rose, to In-Focus Podcast Number 129. Candida is also a budding author. She was born and raised in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and is a second-generation, American-born Cabo Verdiana, whose parents were from the Cape Verdean Islands (Cape Verde).

She is a mother and grandmother. Candida Rose Baptista’s professional stage name is Candida Rose. Her 10-song debut CD is entitled KabuMerikana: The Sum of Me.

She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music specializing in African-American/World music performance, with a minor in African-American Studies from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

Candida also has a Master’s degree from UMass Boston in Transnational, Cultural, and Community Studies. For more info go to www.candidarose.net.

The Artists Index Website Project features the In-Focus Podcasts – up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community. Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works, or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!

Welcome artist and designer, Keith Francis, to In-Focus Podcast Number 128. Keith is an educator, graphic designer, mixed media fine artist, and sculptor.

He earned a B.A. (1990) in Photography and Visual Communications at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth in North Dartmouth, Massachusetts, and his M.F.A. (2018) in Fine Arts from Mass Art (Massachusetts College of Art and Design), Boston, Massachusetts.

Keith also studied Fine Art Photography at Maine Media Workshops & College, Rockport, Maine. His work examines contemporary, social, political, and environmental issues.

Keith talks with The Artist Index’s Co-Founder and Host, Ron Fortier, about his background and lots more. This episode was recorded with Zoom “post-pandemic” in 2022. Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

The Artists Index Website Project features the In-Focus Podcasts – up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community.

Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works, or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!

Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Welcome luthier and musician, Matt Shimala, to In-Focus Podcast Number 127, another podcast by our Indie/Rock Music Host, Scott Bishop. Scott was our podcast guest on Podcast Episode 113.

Matt is a luthier. A luthier is a maker of stringed instruments ranging from violins to guitars. He is an interesting combination of art, craft, and skills for sure!

Matt’s focus and his art are focused on the guitars he builds as well as the instruments he repairs. Matt Shimala also has a love for camping, hiking, running, foraging, astronomy, and mycology, the study of fungi – mushrooms!

Matt talks with The Artist Index’s Music Host, Scott Bishop, about his background and lots more.  This episode was recorded with Zoom “post-pandemic” in 2022.

Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Welcome painter, Ricky Gagnon, to In-Focus Podcast Number 126. Ricky is a self-described native Rhode Islander who has created art in many forms since childhood.

He is a graduate of Tollgate High School in Warwick and also holds two degrees from CCRI (Community College of Rhode Island) with studies in Mechanical Drawing/Architecture and Computer Science. While creating art was always part of his life, he didn’t begin painting until I was about 50.

Ricky says, “My paintings are colorful and vibrant. They vary in style and theme from abstract, landscape, and figurative. I usually work in a series until I have expressed my thoughts and vision about each subject.”

Music courtesy of www.bensound.com