Andrea Melville estimates that, under normal circumstances, 80% of the people who walk past her art gallery each day never stop to see the pieces displayed in the storefront window.
But this weekend, Melivlle noticed more eyes lingering outside of ART, etc., the gallery she runs in Northfield. Rather than deciding whether the large abstract painting that hangs in the window contains more Jasper Johns than Elaine de Kooning, Melville suspects the attention is being driven by recent accusations that the artwork contains antifa propaganda.
On Thursday, Melville’s landlord informed her that he had received complaints from the military community — Northfield is home to Norwich University, a private military college — that the painting contains a logo and symbol for antifa. According to Melville, the landlord said he was considering not renewing the gallery’s lease.
“When I got my jaw off the ground, I said, that’s absurd. There’s nothing there,” Melville said. “I didn’t even know there is — if there even is — an antifa symbol.”
The painting in question is called “Graffiti Art” by Mark Rosalbo, an amateur artist who lives in Randolph. It’s one of about 100 paintings Rosalbo has made during the pandemic, 40 of which are displayed at ART, etc. in an exhibit called “Pandemic Art.”
Melville said “Graffiti Art” is in the window because it’s large — 4 feet by 8 feet — and she had nowhere else to display it.
Before the pandemic, Rosalbo had never tried his hand at painting. He learned to play the piano as a teenager and studied theater in college, but his creative pursuits fell out of habit as he got older. Work, kids, life: the usual story.
Then, in Covid times, Rosalbo and his wife were stuck at home, and their children were at home too, attending school online. He started spending more time in the basement and started to paint, using recycled material and some house paint.
“It just turned into this great project to distract from all the stress that was going on around us,” Rosalbo said.
When he ran out of cardboard, Rosalbo painted on objects he collected while on walks, seeking a reprieve from seemingly endless Zoom meetings. He could work out his atrophied creative muscles, while building a physical catalog of life during the pandemic.
Some patterns emerge from the exhibit when taken as a whole. Grid-shaped patterns frequently appear, which Rosalbo said in a statement are a combination of “childhood dreamlike buildings with images of Zoom grids on a computer.” The works are colorful and playful in Part III, called “Hope,” but more somber in Part II, called “End of Times.”
“I never actually consciously decided what I was going to do on a painting,” Rosalbo said, “but these are the things that were going on in my life that ended up manifesting itself in the works.”
Antifa was not one of those things, Rosalbo said. He had heard of antifa from watching the news, but, like Melville, wasn’t aware of any logo or even a strong grasp of the movement’s ideology.
Determining what antifa is and isn’t can be a bit like interpreting, say, a work of abstract art. Short for “anti-fascist,” antifa is typically understood as a loose network of lone activists or groups who militantly oppose fascism, racism and other forms of far-right ideology.
After the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol, however, some suggested that antifa was actually responsible for the violence. FBI Director Christopher Wray told the Senate Judiciary Committee in March that there was no evidence of antifa’s involvement. Those claims were also denied by the rioters themselves.
‘People see what they want to see’
Melville was shocked by the accusation that she was displaying antifa propaganda in her window. She has operated ART, etc., for almost two years but none of her earlier exhibits prompted this strong a reaction.
“At some point I said, you can look up at the clouds; everyone sees something different,” Melville said. “People see what they want to see, even if it’s not there.”
After being confronted by her landlord on Thursday, Melville said she found out another local businessperson had contacted a local lawyer to see what could be done about the supposed antifa logo on display.
Worried and distraught, Melville made calls to the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont and to the Vermont Human Rights Commission on Friday morning. She also filed a verbal complaint with the Northfield Police Department, she said, and was assured that she has a First Amendment right to keep the painting up.
Melville also made a sign — addressed to “all racists & Fox News loving bigots” — to place next to the “Graffiti Art” painting. “This painting is not what you claim it to be,” it said. “It is art. Period.”
Still, Melville is concerned about losing her lease and about bullying from her neighbors.
The exhibit that preceded Rosalbo’s in ART, etc. was also surrounded by controversy. Last fall, 17 of 19 smaller art pieces created by Northfield High School students were vandalized within two days of being placed in a public park. The pieces were reflections on “The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas, Melville said, a book that highlights anti-Black racism and police brutality.
Someone had taken photos of the pieces before they were vandalized, though, and Melville displayed enlarged versions in her gallery.
‘My father was a colonel’
It’s the comments that suggest Melville doesn’t understand the military that feel the most absurd, she said. Melville said she comes from a family steeped in military service, with strong connections to Norwich University.
Her great-grandfather was president of Norwich, and her father and uncle are both Norwich graduates. One cousin served in the military during the Korean War, and another in the Vietnam War.
Between the Revolutionary War and Vietnam, Melville said, members of her family have served in every single war and conflict.
“They have this attitude of, ‘Well, you don’t understand the military,’” Melville said. “Yeah, I do. My father was a colonel when he retired. I think I know a little bit.”
Rosalbo doesn’t think this incident will stop him from making more art. A deeper part of him, he said, wants to use this moment as something constructive — for the community, for Melville and himself. But at first, he found the response to the gallery disheartening.
“My first reaction was, it’s naive to think that we can try to somehow lessen the division that seems to be getting worse in our country,” Rosalbo said.
