Closing Reception & Artist Talk: Umberto Crenca and William Schaff

Join us to celebrate the closing of this blockbuster exhibition of works by Rhode Island-based artists Umberto Crenca and William Schaff. The reception will include an artist talk!

Umberto Crenca (Bert) is a visual artist, performance artist, and musician with a long exhibition and performance history. His work appears in the permanent collections of the Rhode Island School of Design and Newport Art Museums, and in numerous private collections.

Best known for being co-founder and longtime artistic director of AS220, a nonprofit center for the arts in downtown Providence, Bert is a passionate advocate of the conviction that all people should have access to the means to cultivate and express their creativity. He has received numerous honors and awards for his community work and holds honorary doctorates from Roger Williams and Brown Universities.

William Schaff has been a working artist for over two decades. Known primarily for his mastery at album artwork, (Okkervil River, Godspeed
You! Black Emperor, Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Songs: Ohia, etc.) Schaff is also the founder of Warren Rhode Island’s “Fort Foreclosure”. The building, lovingly named without the least bit of irony, serves as Schaff’s home and studio as well as home and meeting place for other artists (most notably resident musicians MorganEve Swain, and the Late David Lamb, both of Brown Bird). William, recognizing the importance of art in this world, recently expanded his community to the West Coast, where he started “The Outpost”, in Oakland, California. William filled his days creating works of art for private commissions, bands, exhibitions and his own examinations of human interaction. He has since returned to Rhode Island and can be found, daily, working in the Fort.

We will have music, food and drinks on hand! Come see this extensive exhibit and meet the artists!