For his new show at the Tang Museum, “Energy in All Directions,” curator and director Ian Berry has woven together objects, artwork, communities and organizations like the tightly laced spokes of a Shaker basket.
At its most tangible level, the show juxtaposes pieces from the collection of the Shaker Museum at the historic Mount Lebanon site with contemporary work from the Tang’s permanent collection. A spiraling enamel-on-wood piece by Jim Isermann hangs above a circular braided rug made by the Shakers in Canterbury, N.H.; Alexander Ross’ oil painting of a hive-like surface is placed near a Shaker “swarm box” made for transporting bees.
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Collections Manager
Sharon Duane Koomler is a Shaker scholar and traditional letterpress printer living in upstate New York. She has academic degrees in American Folklore from Indiana University and Western Kentucky University. Sharon has worked at Shaker Museums from Kentucky to New Hampshire as an educator, curator, consultant, and director. She has written and published on Shaker material culture and spirituality, and lectured widely on Shaker art, life, and belief. Sharon has a particular interest in the under-researched social aspects of Shaker life and ways in which Shakers practiced inclusion and intentionality.