On the “Weekend Update” satirical news segment on Saturday Night Live. anchor Colin Jost displayed a snapshot of an unhinged rant laced with profanity in the form of a Donald Trump post to Truth Social,...
Wednesday, May 276 - 10pmMyrtle, East Providence Join us for the 4th annual Motif Spoken Awards! We are excited to be returning to Myrtle to celebrate RI’s spoken word community. Want to see your favorite Rhode Island...
By Lillian MK Photography By Olivia Lunger By Izzy Cooke ...
The Music Awards went off without a hitch this year, and over the course of the evening more than 400 local music lovers dropped by to dance, listen, and cheer on fellow musicians. We'll have...
It’s often said (well, I definitely say this), that some of the deepest conversations and connected moments can happen while one is sitting in a car. This is certainly true for the duo, band, sisterhood...
Image: Olivia Lunger. Local Civil War re-enactor Bill Sherman was having trouble recruiting young people into the hobby, so he hit on a novel idea that is perfectly suited to Gen Z. He immediately telephoned his...
The Continental Congress, befooled. April Fool’s Day originated among the French a few years into the Revolutionary War. Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin had been pleading with them for any sort of assistance. The brand...
If you have been a craft beer lover over this past decade, you may remember when the first Rhode Island Brewery Passport was released. It was changed to an app in 2020. Six years later,...
No Kings 3, Mar 28, 2026 No Kings – nokings.org – is a non-violent protest movement responding to the monarchy-like concentration of power in the hands of the president, to the exclusion of Congress and the...
After attending Chalumeau’s release party for their album BLUE at The Met in Pawtucket last August, I wrote that if you ever got the chance to see them perform live, you should jump on it....
On February 28, after 20 years of being a community staple for first dates, Super Tuesday regulars, and movie fanatics alike, CWTheaters (previously called CinemaWorld) was forced to shut its doors for good. The decline...
Last year, I had a blast and a half working on a fun commercial shoot. I landed the gig because the fella producing, Josh Kirk, asked around to find an actor to portray the client’s...
Photo: Jenn Lombari. @jennlombariphotography ssa lin has been making a local splash like a rockin’ rainstorm after a record-setting blizzard, since releasing her first single, “tallboys,” at the end of 2025. The feedback has been good,...
Here are some hot new local tracks to finish melting the ice. The Hopeless Romantics – “Quiet Kind” The third and final single from The Hopeless Romantics’ upcoming debut album, “Quiet Kind” is also a reworked...
Okee dokee folks… PLEASE stop using AI. The more it knows, the more it grows. We are feeding a beast that will someday destroy us. AI is not your friend, though it may pretend to...
Graphic by Olivia Lunger. ...
Hey idiot, why are you and your friends getting high indoors? Don't you know? We have a planet, a whole, big planet filled with trees, rivers, and critters. The outside world doesn't have to start...
Medical marijuana was legalized in Rhode Island in January 2006, and by May 2022 even recreational sales became legal through state-licensed dispensaries and authorized retailers. Yet it still isn’t safe for medical users to come out of the closet....
Cover artist Elliott Italiano of Jamestown is a self-made glass artist. As a young adult, Italiano's interests centered on fashion, inspiring thoughts of pursuing a degree in luxury marketing and design. He relates to his past...
MAD Magazine cover, Feb 2016: Donald Trump and Alfred E. Neuman We fought a military war; our opponents fought a political one. We sought physical attrition; our opponents aimed for our psychological exhaustion. In the process...
Cover artist Mina Miki of Providence calls her baby blanket her longest friend. “His name is Blankie, but now he looks less like a blanket and more like a piece of tangled silk,” she says....
McKee’s Budget Includes Rollbacks for State’s Renewable Energy Programs PROVIDENCE — Five years after lawmakers passed the state’s first firm climate mandates, the historic Act on Climate law is in danger of getting rolled back by...
The closure of the westbound section of the Washington Bridge that occurred in December of 2023 has inspired major grievances within the greater Providence metropolitan area. Traffic within the city limits has become unbearable, especially...
Graphic by Eric Barao When the US Congress allowed the Affordable Care Act subsidies to expire on Dec. 31, 2025, they created a health insurance crisis that could have inspired a plot line for “American Horror...
On January 30, 2026, an estimated 5,000 Rhode Islanders – including students and numerous local businesses – participated in a historic, nationwide strike in an effort to get the tyranny of Immigration and Customs Enforcement...
Okee dokee folks… “Art is fucking political. Always has been, always will be.” I looked for a source to attribute this to but there doesn’t seem to be a definitive person who said it. Doesn’t...
Gregory Alan Isakov and band, with support from the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra at PPAC on Thursday, January 29, 2026. Photo by Gregory Alan Isakov’s tour photographer, Kenzi Everitt, @kenzieveritt. As the house lights dimmed on...
From left to right: Brendan, Charles, Peter, Wil, John, Daniel, Patrick Kinnane, and Jeffrey Azize. I am a hopeful romantic and a huge fan of romcoms. The films often have a woman in the lead navigating...
I’ve never known much about growing flowers. The few gardens I’ve started in my life ended all too unceremoniously, in death. And I’ve never known much about 3-D printing, either. In fact, probably attributed to...
Snow accumulation at TF Green Airport reached 37.9 inches, shattering the all-time record of 28.6 inches set during the legendary Blizzard of 1978. 07:01 pm EST - 2/23/2026TF Green AP, RI37.903:10 pm EST - 2/23/20261 SE...
For cover artist Shey Rivera Ríos, it’s all about community. “I create in all kinds of art forms; I really love performance and visual art,” they say, adding, “All of it is connected to community and organizing.” The artwork for the Motif cover was taken from a poster Rivera Ríos designed for the fundraiser Foo […]
HELLO! This is Dave Dvorchak, AS220’s Communications Director. I’m thrilled to be helping out with this issue of Motif, and all of us at AS220 are grateful for the opportunity to reach readers like you. I’ve been an avid reader of alternative papers (I know that’s not necessarily the term anymore) for most of my […]
A whole lot can happen in six years. Since AS220 hosted its last Foo Fest, the world has shifted on its axis. We’ve lived through a global pandemic, navigated yet another election cycle that tested our democracy, and watched foreign and domestic cities alike burned and destroyed in real-time through our screens. Despite all of […]
Like many Black women, I love all things Octavia Butler, and one of my favorites is the concept of Earthseed; a fictional religion that weaves its values into her novels. The counter-cultural ethos that she describes always reminded me of AS220’s mission and our desperate desire to live in a world that is beautiful, creative, […]
How does it feel for you to be participating in the Growing the Networks show after years of watching the Networks RI project happen? Susan Clausen: It’s great, it just reinforces how massive the artist community is in RI. One project and one sort of perspective could in no way touch the enormous amount of […]
School may be out for summer, but young people at AS220 Youth aren’t taking a break from learning life, business, and creative skills. Youth’s Summer Jobs program is in full swing with 80 young artists and creatives enrolled. I caught up with Janay Pina, AS220’s Director of Programs, to get the details. How is AS220 […]
Haus of Codec is a Providence-based non-profit organization that is dedicated to finding permanent housing solutions and workforce opportunities for LGBTQ youth at risk for, or experiencing, homelessness. I took the opportunity to visit their offices, housed in a converted artist studio at AS220’s Empire Street complex, and talk to Julio Berroa (Executive Director) and […]
The South Providence People’s Archive (SPPA) is a collaborative project between Providence-based artists k. funmilayo aileru and Edwige Charlot. Commissioned through the Providence Commemoration Lab, the SPPA seeks to “contribute intimate accounts of Black and Native American life to the public record” by collecting, recording, and preserving ephemera, objects, and memories “that document the people, […]
A long time ago at a Foo Fest far, far away, I witnessed something marvelous happening. It was late at night, perhaps 11 PM or midnight, and things were beginning to settle down. Everyone was watching the band on the outdoor stage, and the artists, vendors, and organizations who had been doing programming under the […]
Also written by Noah Emanuel Morrison. In celebration of the reopening of AS220’s Paul Krot Community Darkroom, we asked a few community members from the darkroom’s past, present, and future questions about their experiences with and hopes for the space: PAST (PAM MURRAY AND SCOTT LAPHAM): Scott Lapham and Pam Murray: We built it! PM: […]
