"Tourists viewing Niagara Falls from Prospect Point," Platt D. Babbitt.

1."9 Evenings Reconsidered: Art, Theatre, and Engineering, 1966" at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Mass., through July 9, 2006. There once was a time when artists weren't perceived as social outcasts, America embraced their offbeat exuberance, featured them in "Life," and sought their creative counsel. Or, at least Bell Laboratories, under the physicist Billy Kl?did. This provocative show documents that fertile exchange between artists and scientists, which culminated in "9 evenings: Theatre and Engineering" at New York City's Armory from October 13-23, 1966. Among those involved in the extravaganza were Robert Rauschenberg, Yvonne Rainer, John Cage and Bell Labs' engineers Dick Wolf, Robby Robinson and Harold Hodges. Although circuit diagrams, antique electronics and photos dominate (making it difficult for non-geeks to decipher the evenings' thrills), the inspiring video footage and documentary films are absolutely not to be missed. The final project's results may not have been as ground-breaking as NASA's; but there's no denying the sheer respect, creativity, vitality and enthusiasm behind the group's collaborations.

2. "Choreographic Turn" at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, Mass., through July 9, 2006. A contemporary companion piece to "9 Evenings Reconsidered: Art, Theatre, and Engineering, 1966," "Choreographic Turn" features the work of Daria Martin and Peter Welz in collaboration with the dancer/choreographer William Forsythe. Martin paired robots with humans to create footage of a series of evocative 'dances' between the two. Welz strapped five cameras to Forsythe's body, capturing the dancer's movements from kaleidoscopic points of view, thrusting the viewer--walking between the camera's over-life size projections--into the heart of the piece.

Frederic Edwin Church. View more images from this month's exhibits.

3. "Outsiders in Paradise: Rev. Howard Finster & Company" at the Cotuit Center for the Arts in Cotuit, Mass., through July 23, 2006. This show is a tribute to the late Rev. Howard Finster and his legacy. Arguably one of the biggest names in folk art, Rev. Finster hit the 'big time' as the album cover artist for the Talking Heads 1985 Little Creatures. However Finster first started out, at the age of 16, as a tent revival preacher, before turning to art in 1961 with the building of his studio Paradise Gardens. There, he created his whimsically colored, often religious based and ingeniously composed paintings and assemblages. Along with Finster's works, the show features pieces by other outsider artists who came to prominence in the '80s, setting the stage for the more recent interest in Henry Darger.

4. "Motivational Baggage: Caleb Neelon, Andrew Schoultz" at the Boston Center for the Arts' Mills Gallery, through July 30, 2006. Welcome to a land that smacks of medieval knights, swashbuckling pirates and a splash of gothic excess. The Mills Gallery has been taken over by the San Francisco based Andrew Schoultz and the Cambridge based Caleb Neelon. Their styles seamlessly merge into an over-the-top installation that includes a huge boat and drawings stretching from floor to ceiling. The overall impact is an adolescent delight, a surrealistic hybrid of comic book heroes, schoolbook doodlings and graffiti-sized ambitions raised to the level of art-world acclaim.

5. "Brian Willmont: New Work" at the Boston Center for the Arts' Mills Gallery, through July 30, 2006. Neelon and Schoultz's surrealistic narratives find their echo in Brian Willmont's paintings. Somewhat reminiscent of Persian miniatures, time and space are conflated, like a puzzle meant to be unraveled. But, in Willmont's case, the puzzles are more angst-ridden and dream-like. Their fantastical combinations of discordant images create a certain frisson, more often than not, tinged with an undercurrent of dread.

6. "American Artists in Paris, 1850-1900" at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, through September 24, 2006. Capitalizing on the ever-popular stereotype of the bohemian artist, this exhibit offers little new scholarship or insight into 19th century American art. Instead, it dazzles its viewers with mainly middling, but lovely canvases, depicting sun-dappled exteriors, picturesque Parisian boulevards, elegant women, and a handful of scandalous tidbits. The result is the perfect summer show, a breezy walk-through of Paris, complete with all its tantalizing delights.

7. "American Splendor: Hudson River School Masterworks from the Permanent Collection" at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Conn., through October 15, 2006. The Wadsworth Atheneum's founder Daniel Wadsworth was a fan of Hudson River School painting, leaving the museum a fine collection of pieces by such prominent figures as Thomas Cole, Frederic Church and Albert Bierstadt as well as their followers, the Luminists. Initially inspired by the Romantics, the Hudson River School painters eventually created the first school of truly American art, echoing the sentiments of writers like Whitman and Thoreau. Believing that art could function as an agent of spiritual transformation, the artists depicted America's untrampled wilderness as the new Garden of Eden, a place where God resided and man divined.

8. "Eloquent Vistas: The Art of 19 th Century American Landscape Photography from the George Eastman House Collection" at the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Conn., through October 15, 2006. Held in conjunction with American Splendor, this show presents over 70 photographs from the 1840s up until the end of the 19 th century. Organized by the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film and including works by such artists as Eadweard Muybridge, Timothy H. O'Sullivan and Carlton E. Watkins, the show examines photographs of many of the same scenes that the painters transformed into paint. In each case, light played a pivotal role.

9. "Calling Cambodia" at the Laconia Gallery, Boston, Mass., extended through July 29, 2006. The 20th century has seen more than its share of political upheavals and suffering. One more well-known incident is the plight of the Cambodians under the Khmer Rouge. Amy Sanford knows only too well. At the age of 2 1/2 she was sent to America and for a few years thereafter received weekly letters from her father. Then nothing. This installation Suspended is Sanford's attempt to reconnect with her father through 50 letters, hand-stamped on copper foil, wrapped in wire, hung from the ceiling and tenderly pin-point lit like starts in the sky. Suspended also is accompanied by a companion show of Bill Moore's stunning photos of contemporary Cambodian life.

MORE ARTS HEADLINES

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		Arts Features Films at the Gate Photos See photos of kung-fu movies and former Boston Chinatown movie theater locations. Guerrilla Art See photos of local artist Matthew Hincman's bench-like sculpture. "O" is for Original Local artist "Danny O" portrays whimsical scenes of summer in Boston. Multimedia Singer at 100 An exclusive online special explores the controversial work and life of Yiddish writer Isaac Bashevis Singer. Gauguin's Tahiti Paintings Take a multimedia tour of Paul Gauguin's Tahiti paintings, including the famous painting, "Where Are We From." Hawthorne at 200 View a multimedia celebration of Nathaniel Hawthorne's 200th birthday.