This season marks the 20th anniversary of the Frelinghuysen Morris House & Studio as a public site.
The site is celebrating this landmark occasion with an exciting line-up of programming, events and conservation efforts.
Help them kick it off on June 16th, at 3pm with an intimate piano concert in the living room, with the restored Knabe piano. Limited seating so reserve now, free for members. Contact the site for more information.
On June 7, 6:30 pm, the Frelinghuysen Morris House & Studio will serve as co-hosts with the Lenox Library, Chesterwood, Fine Arts Connoisseur magazine and the Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios program, for a free public lecture and reception at the Lenox Library. Dr. Karen Zukowski will present: “City and Country Studios: French, Frelinghuysen, Morris, Judd and other American Artists.” Seating is limited. Please contact vbalint@savingplaces.org or 413-298-2033 to reserve your place.
Other season’s highlights include “Clues behind the Painting” with paintings by Picasso, Braque & Gris mounted on acrylic posts so viewers can see both the front and back. Backs of artworks reveal historic stamps and labels and tell compelling stories in the history of art. Architectural Historian, Richard Guy Wilson lectures on Le Corbusier at the site on August 4th. Painting demonstrations by professional artists are offered every Friday and monthly color workshops are offered on Saturdays.
The Frelinghuysen Morris House & Studio has also recently been awarded a $9,570 grant from the National Film Preservation Foundation to preserve part of the 16mm film collection taken by George L.K. Morris in the 1930's. The Foundation grants target rare films such as silent films and films of sites receiving little media coverage. This grant covers 3 films from a Far East 1934 trip by Morris visiting China, Japan, Cambodia, Indonesia and Hawaii capturing historical and culturally valuable sights of colonial, pre-WWII life. The site has accomplished the goal of digitizing the entire film collection comprising 38, 16mm films and the digital copies have been shared with the public in several exhibits over the years; titled "See Their World." The grant will enable the site to preserve films deteriorating from vinegar syndrome that were too fragile to digitize and view by creating film-film copies of these three films, the best practice in the industry.
Season opens Thursday, June 21-Sunday October 7th. Open Thursday-Sunday 10-3 for hourly guided tours. After Labor Day, Thursday-Saturday.
The site offers a Berkshire county residents’ half-price tour program, Thursday 10 am tour. Through the Library Pass Program, participating local library card holders up to two passes per day to enable increased community access to the House & Studio.
