Whimsy. Most artistic types run from the word like they’re being tailed by a zombie with a nail gun, but folk-art master Warren Kimble is more likely to chase you with a syrup-covered stick. He’s from Vermont, you see. The Whimsical State. Land of sugar maples, quilting bees, folks who say “a-yuh,” and whimsy. Lots of whimsy. Though Kimble’s Naive School paintings are more complex than meets the eye — they’re packed with subsurface symbolism and veiled irony — they’re mostly about the sort of front-porch nostalgia that begs the question, “Why the hell can’t art be fun?”
If you’re sick of trying to suss meaning from pitch-black canvases with $30,000 price tags, check out Kimble’s color-saturated show “A Different Voice."
Thursdays, 10 a.m.-9 p.m.; Mondays-Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays, 10 a.m.-6 p.m.; Sundays, 12-5 p.m. Starts: Feb. 7. Continues through March 9, 2008
