Thursday evening I beheld the fine prints of Peter Thornton lining the walls of City Hall, showing the artist’s sweet take on the most pleasing points in Providence. There was City Hall flanked by the Biltmore, with the Westin addition rising up beyond and Burnside Park across Dorrance Street. There was the Industrial Trust (“Superman”) Bank Building, lit to the nines and standing proud (as once was) beyond the skating rink and Kennedy Plaza. There was Old Stone Bank, with its gilt dome, next to the Providence County Superior Court climbing College Hill to Benefit Street. There was the East Embankment of the Providence River at dusk on a WaterFire night, with Old Stone Square gracefully nudged out of the picture off the print’s right edge.
There are several more that I will not show. There has to be some secrecy, some surprise, for the lover of art, something to call him to learn more of Peter Thornton, who in addition to his prints also illustrates children’s books and is a storyteller to boot. Those and other aspects of his existence in this world, and how to order his prints and the books he has illustrated, are revealed in the website of a very good egg.
Peter’s exhibit runs through May 15 at City Hall, floor the second.
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About David Brussat
For a living, I edit the writing of some of the nation's leading architects, urbanists and design theorists. This blog was begun in 2009 as a feature of the Providence Journal, where I was on the editorial board and wrote a weekly column of architecture criticism for three decades. Architecture Here and There fights the style wars for classical architecture and against modern architecture, no holds barred. My freelance writing and editing on that topic and others addresses issues of design and culture locally and globally. I am a fellow of the Royal Society of the Arts, and a member of the board of the New England chapter of the Institute of Classical Architecture & Art, which bestowed an Arthur Ross Award on me in 2002. I work from Providence, R.I., where I live with my wife Victoria, my son Billy and our cat Gato.
If you would like to invest your prose with even more style and clarity, please email me at my consultancy, dbrussat@gmail.com, or call 401.351.0457.
Testimonial: "Your work is so wonderful - you now enter my mind and write what I
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- Nikos Salingaros, mathematician at the University of Texas, architectural theorist and author of many books.
Very nice, David. Keep up the great work. – Steve Wallace
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These are beautiful! The mayor has another exhibit in his administrative offices, too – photographs of Providence – in cooperation with the Art League RI – a City Hall full of art!
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