Allen M. Spivack
After working for over 45 years in a variety of settings- fundraising, home renovation, stay-at-home dad, and social work-Allen decided to (finally!) devote his time to making sculpture, a passion he’s nurtured for decades. Allen’s professional work speaks to his skills in program management, team building, curriculum development, training, individual and group clinical work as well as project management. He was the Director of Development for the MA American Heart Association, ran a general contracting business for 12 years, and worked for the MA Department of Public Health in HIV and housing services.He also managed HIV housing services and developed supportive housing for the City of Boston and created two innovative residential treatment programs in Roxbury, MA at The Dimock Center for women with trauma, mental health and substance abuse issues. He has also organized and facilitated groups for abusive men.
Allen lives in Jamaica Plain, MA and works out of OMOS Studios (the Other Man Of Steel) located in his converted two car garage. Allen is self-trained. He's taken classes at MASSART (MA College for Art and Design) and Stonybrook Fine Arts Studio and been mentored by David Stromeyer, the renowned VT-based sculptor. He is an avid reader about art history and individual artists. He regularly visits art museums in and around Greater Boston and when traveling in the US and abroad, makes museum visits his first priority. Allen’s career as an artist started later in his life, but as he notes, "My life experience is quite rich and complex, filled with plenty of adventures that inform my work. I’ve lived a very full and purposeful life, and I draw on this reservoir of accumulated experience to make my art.” His work reflects a wide range of themes and stories, inspired by social justice issues, Jewish themes, personal events or flights of the imagination. In recent years, his particular focus has been on gun violence and genocide. Allen has participated in gallery shows at the Uforge Gallery in Boston, MA, Salem State University in Salem, MA, the Imago Gallery in Warren, RI, the Attleboro Art Museum in Attleboro, MA and Hebrew College in Newton, MA. He has been a part of several online gallery shows. Allen exhibited his sculptures for the last seven years (2017-2023) in the annual Flying Horse Outdoor Sculpture Exhibit at The Pingree School in South Hamilton, MA. His sculpture, 13 Acts of Creation, appeared in the 2019 NESA-sponsored show at the Crane Estates (Trustee of Reservation ) in Ipswich, MA. Allen also had sculpture in the NESA-sponsored show at the MA Horticultural Society show at Elm Banks in Wellesley, MA in 2018. Allen participated in Jamaica Plain Open Studios for many years where hundreds of people visited his studio during the weekend. Allen participated in the Studio Without Walls show in Brookline, MA since 2019. Monument to Lost Gloves, was part of the in 2019 show and in 2020 he showed Yet Another Sunrise...Tomorrow. In 2021, his Trees of the Garden of Eden was in the SWW show. In 2022, Allen installed his work about genocide called Blossoms of a Thousand Deaths. Allen showed Monument to Lost Gloves in the 2021 Sculpture Now! Sculpture Exhibition at The Mount in Lenox, MA. Allen's sculptural tribute to the Stuart Davis masterpiece, Hot Still Scape-7th Avenue Style in Six Colors (at the MFA, Boston) is currently displayed in Leslie's Retreat Park in Salem, MA until April 2024. Allen has also donated several of his sculptures to non-profit organziations and schools. A puzzle piece sculpture was donated to a New Jersey-based autism organization (the puzzle piece is the logo for autism) for its annul auction. Allen donated a decorative coat rack for a Volunteers for America fundraiser and also donated a puzzle piece sculpture to the Jamaica Plain-based teen afterschool program, Boston Scores. To honor his participation in the Flying Horse Outdoor Sculpture Exhibit at the Pingree School in South Hamilton, MA, Allen donated his musical sculpture, Stairway to Heaven, to the school. It was placed over the entryway to the creative arts building. Allen has been a member of the New England Sculptors Association (NESA) since 2017 and served on its board of directors. He participates in several monthly artist get-togethers to connect with artists, discuss the art-making process and develop new friendships. Allen has been married for 50 years to Sherry Grossman, an early childhood educator, life coach and yoga instructor. They have two sons and two grandchildren. |
Jigsaw
by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner
(puzzle piece sculptures inspired by this poem-go to Art Gallery tab under "Themed Art")
Each lifetime is the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
For some there are more pieces.
For others the puzzle is more difficult to assemble.
Some seem to be born with a nearly completed puzzle.
And so it goes.
Souls go this way and that.
Trying to assemble the myriad parts.
But know this. No one has within themselves
All the pieces to their puzzle.
Everyone carries with them at least one and probably many pieces
To someone else's puzzle.
Sometimes they know it.
Sometimes they don't.
And when you present your piece to another
Whether you know it or not,
Whether they know it or not,
You are a messenger from the Most High.
by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner
(puzzle piece sculptures inspired by this poem-go to Art Gallery tab under "Themed Art")
Each lifetime is the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
For some there are more pieces.
For others the puzzle is more difficult to assemble.
Some seem to be born with a nearly completed puzzle.
And so it goes.
Souls go this way and that.
Trying to assemble the myriad parts.
But know this. No one has within themselves
All the pieces to their puzzle.
Everyone carries with them at least one and probably many pieces
To someone else's puzzle.
Sometimes they know it.
Sometimes they don't.
And when you present your piece to another
Whether you know it or not,
Whether they know it or not,
You are a messenger from the Most High.