Plein Air Peconic Celebrates 10 Years with New Show
The artists of Plein Air Peconic are celebrating the group’s 10th anniversary with a new landscape art exhibition and sale, Plein Air Peconic X, at Ashawagh Hall in Springs over Columbus Day weekend, October 10–12.
Participating artists include landscape painters Casey Chalem Anderson, Susan D’Alessio, Terry Elkins, Michelle Margit, Gordon Matheson, Joanne Rosko and Eileen Dawn Skretch, and photographers Tom Steele, Kathryn Szoka and Ellen Watson.
With the belief that art has the power to connect people to the environment, and in partnership with the Peconic Land Trust over the past decade, Plein Air Peconic has made it their mission to create artwork focused on importance of land conservation on the East End, and to raise money for that cause.
A portion of all proceeds from Plein Air Peconic X will be donated to the Peconic Land Trust, which has conserved more than 11,000 acres of land on Long Island since their inception in 1983, including working farms, pristine natural sites and culturally important parcels.
“Through their paintings and photographs, the artists of Plein Air Peconic capture the effects of light and atmospheric conditions here on the East End of Long Island,” East Hampton gallerist and art historian Terry Wallace explains.
In this upcoming show, the Plein Air Peconic artists will exhibit artworks depicting East End farms, beaches and wetlands—many of which have been conserved thanks to the Peconic Land Trust.
Plein Air Peconic was formed in 2005 when 13 plein air artists and landscape photographers joined together to continue the traditions set in place by Tile Club members and the East End’s first plein air painters, William Merritt Chase and Winslow Homer. The group has exhibited widely in galleries on the North and South Forks, created traveling exhibitions for East End libraries to further land conservation education, and hosted forums on the intersection of landscape art and conservation.
Plein Air Peconic X is open from 10 a.m.–8 p.m. on Saturday, October 10, with an artists reception from 5–8 p.m. that evening. The show continues on Sunday and Monday, October 11–12, from 10 a.m.–5 p.m., with a Meet the Artists Coffee (sponsored by Hampton Coffee Co.) from 11 a.m.–1 p.m. on Sunday.
The award-winning short documentary Growing Farmers, about the new crop of East End farmers, will be screened each day at 11:30 a.m. Directed by world famous photographer Michael Halsband, and co-produced by Hilary Leff and the Peconic Land Trust, the film also explores the Trust’s work with farmers in the region. Growing Farmers received the Audience Choice Award at the 2012 Hamptons International Film Festival where it premiered.
To learn more about Plein Air Peconic and their good work, both on and off the canvas, visit pleinairpeconic.com. Read more about the Peconic Land Trust at peconiclandtrust.org.