Mystery Box: Student Artists At Work Coachman’s House Gallery | June – November 2015

Throughout the 2015 summer and fall season, The Olana Partnership gave nine Bard College students the opportunity to participate in a “research-based” artist residency program. On their first day they were given a box of unknown objects and materials that had been assembled by The Olana Partnership staff; all of these poems, photographs, and historic documents surfaced from Olana’s collections and circled around the theme “Trees, Art, and Tourism”. Throughout …Read More

Treasures from Olana – Landscapes by Frederic Edwin Church

Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900) was probably the most renowned American artist of the Civil War era. Trained by Thomas Cole, the founder of the Hudson River School of landscape painters, and stimulated by the writings of the famed explorer and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, Church early demonstrated immense talent and global curiosity. He traveled extensively, and in his New York City studio painted monumental pictures of subjects in North and South America, the sub-Arctic, Europe, and the Near East. From the late 1850s to the 1870s, he displayed his most ambitious …Read More

Groundswell Olana’s Ridge Road – One Day Only | September 19 – September 19, 2015

Photo: Alon Koppel

The Olana Partnership and Wave Farm’s WGXC 90.7-FM are pleased to co-present a third iteration of their award-winning exhibition event Groundswell. Hundreds will converge at Olana State Historic Site for site-specific performance and works and in sound, installation, broadcast, and movement.

We are delighted to announce the 2015 participating artists who reflect on and react to Olana and its integral viewshed as an ambitious and early environmental work:

John Cage Trust with Seth Chrisman
John Cleater
Brian Dewan
Gambletron
Tyson Hauf
…Read More

On the Road In The Temple of The Self Museum Villa Stuck, Munich, Germany | November 20, 2013 – March 2, 2014

Olana loaned five works to the exhibition In the Temple of the Self: The Artist’s Residence as a Total Work of Art presented by the Museum Villa Stuck, Munich. Olana is one of twenty artist homes highlighted in the exhibition and one of only three representing the United States. The artist’s homes were chosen as the supreme examples of the ideas, styles and eras they represent from 1800 to 1948; and because the residences rank among their creators’ …Read More

All the Raj: Frederic Church and Lockwood de Forest Evelyn and Maurice Sharp Gallery | May 11 – November 2, 2014

All the Raj – Frederic Church and Lockwood de Forest: Painting, Decorating and Collecting at Olana, an exhibition featuring oil sketches and decorative arts by landscape painter and 19th century tastemaker Lockwood de Forest, is currently on view at Olana, the historic home and studio of Frederic Church. Lockwood de Forest (1850-1932) studied painting with his great-uncle the eminent landscape artist Frederic Church in the 1870s; the exhibition begins by highlighting sketches showing that the two artists worked side by side …Read More

Preserving Creative Spaces Coachman’s House Gallery at Olana | June 28 – November 2, 2014 This documentary installation shines light on the Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios (HAHS) program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. HAHS is a consortium of institutions across the United States committed to the conservation, interpretation, and public accessibility of artists’ homes and workspaces. This exhibition features information about the consortium and documentary photographs and personal artists’ quotes from its nearly 40 member sites, including an image of Frederic Church and his son on a camel in Beirut (1868), the trip which inspired the Persian-style …Read More

On the Road Scottish National Gallery | May 11 – September 8, 2013 | National Gallery London | February 6 – April 28, 2013 Evelyn and Maurice Sharp Gallery | May 14 – November 5, 2017

Olana, the home and artist-designed landscape of nineteenth-century Hudson River School painter Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900), loaned thirteen works from its collection for the exhibition Through American Eyes: Frederic Church and the Landscape Oil Sketch, which was on view at the National Gallery, London, from February 6 through April 28, 2013. The selection from Olana included work never before exhibited. “Working with the National …Read More

Groundswell Olana’s Ridge Road | September 22, 2013 | September 13, 2014

Olana’s 250-acre landscape was originally designed in response to its essential and spectacular views–the “Olana Viewshed”–by Hudson River School artist Frederic Church. On September 13, during this one-day exhibition event, audiences will explore the property’s undiscovered roads and naturalistic scenes as they encounter each project site. Picnicking will take place at a breathtaking clearing, which overlooks the Hudson River, the Catskill Mountains and beyond. The event will culminate with a performance by celebrated composer and artist William Basinski.

Groundswell installations and performances will be sited along Olana’s historic Ridge …Read More

Maine Sublime Cleveland Museum of Art October 5, 2014-January 25, 2015 | Olana State Historic Site, Evelyn and Maurice Sharp Gallery June 9-October 27, 2013 | Portland Museum of Art June 30-September 30, 2012

Frederic Church was America’s most important painter during the middle years of the 19th century. While famous for his scenes of the Arctic, South America, and the Near East, his landscapes of Maine were central to his career for over four decades. This exhibition explored first his early mastery of the conventions of art history, the expressions of national history during his maturity, and finally the …Read More

Olana’s Dynamic Landscape – Photographs by Peter Aaron Olana Coachman’s House Gallery | May 19 – October 31, 2012

Peter Aaron is a pioneer in combining cinematic style with architectural photography techniques. Now working with digital capture, his well-composed, trademark images are always lively and luminous. He studied organic chemistry at St Edmund Hall, Oxford University, and received a BA in physics from Bard College and an MFA from the New York University Institute of Film and Television. He worked as a film cameraman before deciding to concentrate on architectural photography which has been his specialty for over 35 years. …Read More