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Arts

Cultivating healing, softness, and self-love: Q&A with artist Maddie Lam

September 21, 2021 Christina Appignani 3

By Christina Appignani. Photos by Keren He. Maddie Lam, an up-and-coming musician, was born and raised in Malden, Massachusetts. For Lam, music is a means to express her pain and a dream that does not let itself be abandoned. Lam’s interest in music started young and continued throughout high school — as a child, she learned how to play various instruments before gaining an interest in writing her own songs. Lam graduated from Malden High School in 2016 and participated in the Malden High School Choral Arts Program. Lam has released her own music on online platforms such as Spotify and SoundCloud, her most recent single being “Sunflower Song.” Her musical style, which often includes melancholic but sweet lyrics accompanied by slow piano and ukulele melodies, is showcased in her latest release. She also helped arrange the performing arts festival “Our Voice, Our Stories: The Beauty & Resilience of Immigrants” as part of the larger Malden Summer 2021 Festival on August 7. This festival celebrated immigrants, children of immigrants and multicultural communities through music, art, […]

Arts

Sketching for Twenty-five Years: Malden Sketch Group

September 1, 2020 NeighborhoodView 0

By Sharon Santillo Like a small acorn that grew into a large tree, a small grant  given to the Malden Sketch Group 25 years ago led to one of the longest lasting drawing groups in the Greater Boston area.  “I thought it would only last as long as the initial grant, but look what that seed money has done,” said Fred Seager, one of the founders.  Another founder was Nunzio Luca. “He was a much admired head of the Malden High School Art Department for years, and was a wonderful artist, mentor, and good friend,” Seager said.  Nunzio and Seager decided to get a life drawing group together and they set out to find a space. “We were fortunate also to have the early support of Neicei Degen and Nana Goldberg who were facilitators of the cultural center building, an old fire station on Pearl Street. It housed elderly day care during the day and was open for rental at night,” Seager said. Seager applied for a grant from the Malden Arts Council and was awarded $250. This modest […]

Arts

For eyes and ears only

February 3, 2017 maldenmediacenter 0

The cross section between visual art and music, for classical pianist Yelena Beriyeva, is in many ways second nature. “What is in common between [visual] artists and musicians is they all get to create,” Beriyeva said. In the spring of 2016, visual artists came together to attend a performance of classical composer Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition.” From the artists present at the workshop, and many more, over 40 inspired pieces of visual art were born. On Nov. 5, 2016 at Jenkins Auditorium at Malden High School, Beriyeva performed the renowned “Pictures at an Exhibition” to the backdrop of all the work created from the artists using the music as inspiration. The interesting part is Mussorgsky’s piece, Beriyeva said, was first inspired by visual art. With the passing of an artist friend, Mussorgsky wrote “Pictures at an Exhibition” through the careful study of his late friend’s artwork. “[Mussorgsky] basically dedicated this piece to a friend he lost to a sickness,” Beriyeva said. “We did it in the reverse. We tried to paint based on music.” […]

Arts

Breathtaking art at ‘Malden Reads’ event

February 25, 2014 neighbormedia 0

Malden Public Library’s Converse Building served as a stunning backdrop to the “Malden Reads” kick-off celebration on Thursday, February 20. Did you know that the awe-inspiring art collection was financed by shoe tycoon Elisha Slade Converse and his wife? Not only did Converse pay for the ornate building, he left $50,000 after his death in 1904.