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september 9 24
One of Joy Brown’s ceramic sculptures peeks from an overgrown patch of greenery. Brown has been crafting her human-like figures in caly and bronze for 30 years. “They’ve become more and more expressive over the years,” she says. “They have a friendly, peaceful presence that acts as a witness to the activity around them.” Brown loves the interaction her works inspire with onlookers. “Wherever they are displayed in public they become a magnet for people who crawl or sit on them and interact with them in other ways.”
Photo by Winona Ballentine-Barton
THE HOUSE, PAGE 20
DEPARTMENTS
6 On the Cover: James Esber
James Esber’s portraits blend pop art and surrealism, making nods to both R. Crumb and Norman Rockwell.
10 Esteemed Reader
Jason Stern pays close attention to the present 13 Editor’s Note
Brian K. Mahoney makes a pitch for zeros and ones.
FOOD & DRINK
14 An Elegy for Lodger
Explore the hidden world of Leon Johnson’s Lodger, an eclectic gathering space in Newburgh, where art, food, and community intertwine. From its clandestine beginnings to becoming a vibrant hub, we delve into its impact, the people it touched, and its ongoing legacy.
17 Sips and Bites
Recent openings include Sorry, Charlie in Kingston, Nansense in Beacon, the Governess in Poughkeepsie, Circles in Hudson, and The Rolling Cones in Kingston.
THE HOUSE
20 Soul Fire Sanctuary
Acclaimed sculptor Joy Brown has built a Japaneseinspired forest sanctuary outside Kent, Connecticut where she lives, works, and creates community around her annual wood-fired kiln firing event each summer.
HEALTH & WELLNESS
30 The Mega-warehouse Next Door
As mega-warehouses proliferate around the region worsening air quality for local residents, an attempt to regulate vehicular emissions, the Clean Deliveries Act, is making its way through the state Assembly.
COMMUNITY PAGES
34 Hudson: Kaleidoscopic City
The Columbia County seat as explored through the lens of Hudson resident and photographer David McIntyre.
43 Hudson Pop-Up Portraits
52 Sullivan County: Quiet Transformation
Sullivan County blends timeless tranquility with evolving sophistication. It now boasts high-caliber arts, awardwinning dining, and artisan shops. From luxury wellness retreats to rustic vineyards, it offers diverse experiences amidst picturesque landscapes, preserving its charm while embracing growth.
RURAL INTELLIGENCE
50 Marilyn Monroe: The Final Shoot
In 1962, photographer Bert Stern was sent by Vogue to shoot Marilyn Monroe for a multi-page fashion spread. It was her last photo shoot—she overdosed six weeks later. “Marilyn Uncovered,” at Sohn Fine Art in Lenox, Massachusetts exhibits Stern’s photos from the shoot.
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9 24
Side-by-Side Coats, Ann Hamilton, 2018-2023, at ‘T’ Space in Rhinebeck along with “Shou Sugi Ban Sculptures” by James Casabere.
Photo by Kathryn Clark
THE GUIDE, PAGE 67
ARTS
58 Music
Jason Broome reviews Happy Hour by Mark Brown. Tristan Geary reviews New Morse Code by Zan and the Winter Folk. Jeremy Schwartz reviews The Stabbing Jabs by the Stabbing Jabs. Plus listening recommendations from Frank Bango, singer-songwriter and general manager of the Bearsville Theater.
59 Books
Susan Yung reviews The Bulgarian Training Manual, Ruth Bonapace’s new novel tracking an unsuccessful real estate broker’s unlikely path to bodybuilding global stardom. Plus short reviews of Return to Wyldcliffe Heights by Carol Goodman; Collector of Lapsed Times by David Appelbaum; As True as the Barnacle Tree, Second Edition by Anita M. Smith; The Lonesome Threesome by Hawley Hussey; and Band People: Life and Work in Popular Music by Franz Nicolay.
60 Poetry
Poems by Ryan Brennan, Tom Cherwin, Jean Churchill, David W. Brown, Clifford Henderson, Piper Jaden Levine, David Lukas, C. P. Masciola, Karen Savino, Penny Scofield, Alyssa VanPelt, Bruce Weber, and Claudia Wysocky. Edited by Phillip X Levine.
GUIDE
62 The Downtown Upstate Theater Festival brings experimental theater to Pine Plains and Ancram this month.
63 Danielle Klebes’s immersive installation “A Dyke Cabin of One’s Own” is on view at Mother-in-Laws in Germantown.
65 Cabot Parsons performs adult puppet theater in Beacon.
67 Sculptures by James Casabere at ‘ T’ Space in Rhinebeck.
68 The 2024 Kaatsbaan Annual Festival kicks off September 13.
70 Short List: Hudson Valley Garlic Fest, Newburgh Open Studios, Lewis Black, Garrison Craft, and more.
71 Live Music: Cat Power at UPAC, Gogol Bordello at Empire Live, Country Gongbang at the Falcon, and more.
72 Listings of museum and gallery shows across the region.
HOROSCOPES
76 The Deep End
Cory Nakasue reveals what the stars have in store for us.
PARTING SHOT
80 A Sculpture’s Quest for Freedom
The journey of Trina’s Greene’s sculpture of Sojourner Truth.
Connecting the Dots
James Esber’s Pop Surrealism
Brooklyn-based artist James Esber paints portraits that blend pop art and surrealism with comic sensibility. His colorful work Selfie II depicts an abstract face with whimsical curls.
About Selfie II Esber says, “I try to trust muscle memory to produce interesting results. The drawing that preceded this painting was started by making dots on the paper and then connecting them. I liked the randomness of that, but also the idea of a faceless face. As I added to the drawing and built the edges of a head around the dots, I decided to use my own head as a template and make a kind of self-effacing self-portrait.”
Esber’s work nods to lifelong inspirations including Norman Rockwell, Picasso, MAD magazine, Hummel figurines, R. Crumb and artists of his generation like Nicole Eisenman, John Currin, Inka Essenhigh, and his wife of 38 years Jane Fine.
Selfie II will be on display in a group show with Jane Fine, Tracey Goodman, and Jim Leen at Catskill Art Space in Livingston Manor through October 26.
Established in 1971, Catskill Art Space reopened in October 2022 following a major renovation and expansion of its multi-arts center. The art center presents exhibitions, performances, and events featuring national and regional talents.
James Esber and Jane Fine will present three intertwined bodies of work that exist at the border between figuration and abstraction. Ruggedly masculine passages bump against petite strings of flowers.
Conceived as a three-person show created by two people, the exhibit is titled “Three-Sided Coin” and showcases individual and collaborative pieces made under the pseudonym J. Fiber.
The images made by Esber and Fine employ acrylic, colored pencil, graphite, and ink. The couple typically pass drawings back and forth, challenging each other throughout the process. The boundary between his and hers is always meaningful, and their drawings are rife with drama.
“We both had plenty of our own pieces to choose from but decided not to use any existing J. Fiber pieces, and instead to make one large new work. This ended up being a snake-like cluster of 11 collaborative drawings which butt up to each other and carry forms, ideas, and colors from one drawing directly into the next,” say Esber. “It’s a bit of a food fight for sure, but hopefully a beautiful one. The thing I love about collaborations is that they throw you off balance and bring new things into your work.”
“I don’t believe that an artist should start with an idea and create the form to communicate it,” Esber adds. “I think it’s much more interesting to draw from ideas which excite you and make a piece in response to them. Ultimately, there should be a lot of room for interpretation. I think an artist’s role is to create a beautiful and original hybrid form from which the viewer can construct their own meaning,”
—Mike Cobb
Selfie II, James Esber, acrylic on PVC panel, 48” x 38”, 2023
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OPEN HOUSE
Saturday, October 26, 2024 10am - 12pm
16 S Chestnut Street, New Paltz, NY 12561 mountainlaurel.org • 845-255-0033
esteemed reader by
Jason Stern
Without contraries there is no progression.
—William Blake
Early in the morning in the kitchen, I set my coffee on the windowsill. Turning away I heard glass shatter and hot liquid hit my leg. The vessel I half-placed on the ledge had fallen to the ceramic tiles below. After the initial shock, I paused and felt what had happened. I had not placed the glass with attention. I was already moving on to the next thing. I had not been present.
Brought into a greater alertness by the rude awakening I swept shards, mopped coffee, and vacuumed the spot to be sure that my inattention would not do further damage by planting a sliver of glass in the sole of some beloved member of my household.
I could see that despite all my fine ideas I did not pay attention to the simple, practical task of placing a glass on the shelf. The result has been a renewed, albeit halting, attempt at mindfulness in simple activities. Can I make less noise when placing clean silverware back in the drawer? Can I be alert to notice that the cat’s meow says she is hungry? Can I stop and listen to the person who is speaking to me? Can I finish what I start? Can I be present?
I’m certain innumerable similar destructive results of inattention, lacking the drama of shattered glass, go unnoticed. Thankfully, this one gave a shock that I could use as a reminder.
The inner work teacher George Gurdjieff said the following to a group of students a hundred years ago, and the words ring true today:
It is only with the present that you repair the past and prepare the future. The future and the past do not exist without the present. The present exists to repair all our mistakes and to prepare the future, that is to say, another life, desirable for you.
It is very important for you to feel the present. You must do everything in order to have a present. This goes for everyone, but especially for you.
It is necessary to have a present. The past is the past; yesterday is finished. It will never return. Tomorrow can come, but a different tomorrow depends on the presence of today.
It is necessary to practice. It is necessary to do everything today.
I see that simply wanting to practice attention does not give sufficient force for a deep and sustained effort. I need to be able to make use of what Gurdjieff called “the denying force.” This means seeing and feeling the shock of my lack of presence and its results, and using the force of that shock to impel a new effort. In this sense, apparent failures provide the fuel for a genuine inner work in the present.
“Presence” is a fine-sounding word, which by all accounts represents something appealing. The difficulty arises when I realize it includes both the pleasant and the unpleasant, including those facts and experiences I would otherwise reject or ignore.
I see this when I go outside and listen. The bird and bug-song, the song of the wind blowing through trees, the crack of thunder are sounds I love to hear. But behind these delicious sounds is the growl of engines, tires whistling on roads, canned pop music. These I would automatically reject, and even resent. And I see that I need to hear all of it together.
Walking up the steep Stairmaster path at the Mohonk Preserve I notice that my legs ache and breath is short. I almost express fatigue to my friend walking behind but then something in me chooses to keep silent, and I am able to feel the discomfort and carry on. This decision, or sacrifice of complaint, gives force to my effort to sense my feet on the stones.
A longtime friend takes great care to tell me about my ignorance and faults, my unfair privilege and ingratitude. Though not always successful I take care not to argue as there is often truth in her critiques. She affords me an invaluable denying force. My friend is elderly and I try to return service by being helpful in practical ways.
To work in the present I am invited to be receptive to the difficulties, whether they be physical pain, emotional distress, or even ideological disagreements. Life affords abundant material for repairing the past and preparing the future.
Author Jason Stern will open a new inner work group in the Fourth Way tradition of G. I. Gurdjieff in September. Join the introductory meeting, and hear a talk titled “21st Century Seekers: A Practical Work for Being,” Thursday, September 19, 7pm, 64 Plains Road, New Paltz. Harmonious development.org.
Photo @davidmcintyrephotography for @Chronogram
EDITORIAL
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Brian K. Mahoney brian.mahoney@chronogram.com
CREATIVE DIRECTOR David C. Perry david.perry@chronogram.com
DIGITAL EDITOR Marie Doyon marie.doyon@chronogram.com
ARTS EDITOR Peter Aaron music@chronogram.com
HOME EDITOR Mary Angeles Armstrong home@chronogram.com
POETRY EDITOR Phillip X Levine poetry@chronogram.com
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Anne Pyburn Craig apcraig@chronogram.com
contributors
Winona Barton-Ballentine, Jason Broome, Mike Cobb, Melissa Dempsey, Mike Diago, Julia Dixon, Tristan Geary, Hillary Harvey, Ryan Keegan, David McIntyre, Cory Nakasue, Jeremy Schwartz, Sparrow, Taliesin Thomas, Lynn Woods, Susan Yung
PUBLISHING
FOUNDERS Jason Stern, Amara Projansky
PUBLISHER & CEO Amara Projansky amara.projansky@chronogram.com
EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT Jan Dewey jan.dewey@chronogram.com
BOARD CHAIR David Dell
sales manager
Andrea Fliakos andrea.fliakos@chronogram.com
media specialists
Kaitlyn LeLay kaitlyn.lelay@chronogram.com
Kelin Long-Gaye kelin.long-gaye@chronogram.com
Kris Schneider kris.schneider@chronogram.com
ad operations
Jared Winslow jared.winslow@chronogram.com new business development/media assistant
It’s come to my attention that some readers of this magazine—the print version that is—are unaware of the vast trove of Chronogram content available online. To wit: We post new stories every day on Chronogram.com—only a fraction of which are published in print. These articles run the gamut of our coverage, from event previews to restaurant profiles to environmental coverage and beyond. Just this week (the week of August 12, as I’m writing to you from the past) we published stories on a new Afghan restaurant in Beacon, environmental activists questioning the efficacy of the PCB clean-up effort in the Hudson River, folks fundraising to restore the crumbling infrastructure of the Hudson-Athens Lighthouse, and a profile of Ulster County’s first legal adult-use cannabis dispensary in New Paltz.
Now I’m not going to suggest you set Chronogram.com as your homepage or
bookmark us or check back to our site every day for updates or keep a tab open to our site. While highly encouraged for those wanting to stay au courant with what’s happening in the region, I realize this level of constant engagement is an unrealistic expectation on the time budgets of the content overstimulated. There is a nifty solution to how to get all of Chronogram’s content delivered to your inbox: Subscribe to our newsletter. Which brings us to the ugly symbol clogging up this page’s real estate. (It is unsightly, isn’t it? But the path of progress is not always straightforward. Think of hydrogen blimps, or Betamax, or the Segway.)
I think so highly of our five weekly newsletters—Monday is an events round-up, Tuesday is real estate, Thursday is culture and lifestyle, Friday is food and drink, Saturday is the weekend digest—that I am willing to share the sacred terrain of my Editor’s Note with this odious digital scribble known as a QR code.
This QR code is your portal to the vast splendor that is Chronogram’s digital content. This fancy tech doohickey—technically a two-dimensional matrix barcode, developed in 1994 by the Japanese company Desno Wave for labeling automobile parts—will lead you to a landing page where you can subscribe to all of our insightful newsletters and be the person always in the know. I mean, there’s nothing quite like the street cred you get from always having the latest intel on new restaurants, bars, shops, and things to do. We’ll be your cheat sheet. Take out your phone and scan the QR code to subscribe now. If you don’t, we’ll just run it again next month until you do!
And finally, a shout-out to my colleague Jason Stern, an early champion of QR codes whom I subjected to ridicule and derision a decade ago when he suggested we use them in the magazine. Look at us now!
An Elegy for Lodger LEON JOHNSON’S “TRAVELING CIRCUS” ROLLS ON
By Mike Diago
If you walk north from Broadway in Newburgh up the quieter side of Liberty Street, you’ll reach a spot where the bluestone pavers bulge over the roots of a Norwegian Maple—the largest tree on the block. Under its canopy, there’s a 19th-century, three-story rowhouse with a storefront, number 188.
The storefront has always had a clandestine mystique. About 15 years ago, I often walked by after delivering my social work clients to the substance abuse clinic a few doors down, always slowing my stroll to check it out. A sunburst was carved or painted above the door; it seemed like a pagan calling card. Dark curtains covered the long windows, so, peering in, all I could see was my reflection and the tree swaying behind me. I was new in town, and I suspected I might find my people there—later, I heard a rumor that it was a lair for an anarchist collective—but I never encountered anyone, just rotting leaves gathered at the threshold of a locked door.
Then, after 10 years away from the neighborhood, I was invited in.
A Kitchen in the Back
On a Saturday afternoon in late September 2019, I was grilling a large paella at a farmers’ market nearby (I had been writing about food for a few years at that point and was just beginning to cook for small events) when a restaurateur named Sisha Ortuzar came by for a plate and told me I should meet him at a place called Lodger at 188 Liberty Street. “It’s not a restaurant, exactly. You’ll see,” he said. When I arrived that evening, the sunburst on the door was gone; two canvases, each decorated with medieval Italian paintings of blue root vegetables, had replaced the dark window curtains, and the threshold had been swept clean. Squeezing the thumb latch, the door opened, and an aroma of curry and warm North African spices bloomed. Around the small studio’s perimeter Faustian sculptures, crystal shrines, and antique books sat on shelves; brass light fixtures hung on the monochrome cobalt blue walls; vases of flowers, dead and alive, and terracotta bowls filled with potatoes and long-stemmed garlic sat on antique tapestries draped over long tables.
The backyard patio at Lodger in Newburgh.
The front table was perpendicular to the door, blocking the path. A small group sat there quietly over soup bowls, barely clinking silverware as they ate. I locked eyes with a skinny man with a large mustache I vaguely recognized. I wasn’t sure if I had just interrupted some private anarchist meeting, so I explained, “I’m supposed to be meeting Sisha here.” No one responded. As the awkwardness became unbearable, Ortuzar arrived and led me around the table to a kitchen in the back.
It was smaller than a home kitchen, with only a small range and a refrigerator. The chef, a big guy dressed all in black with a full gray beard and hair, was crouched before the open oven door, trying to cram a brick underneath one of the racks to keep it from falling over. He stood, looked at us, and then boomed at Ortuzar in a South African accent, “Not a good time, mate!” He lifted the lid on a pot of curried chicken, tasted a spoonful, and then walked to the front to charm the guests. The patrons became loud and cheerful in short order.
Collaboration Cauldron
Ortuzar and I moved to the backyard and sat at a bistro table. I told him that I was always curious about the place. The inside was like nothing I could have imagined, but also, somehow, fit what I expected. I was surprised when he said it
had only been open for a year.
He told me all about it: The irascible and gregarious man we’d just met was Ortuzar’s good friend Leon Johnson. He was an artist and retired art professor who had moved to town from South Africa by way of San Francisco, Oregon, and, most recently, Detroit. This space, Lodger, wasn’t a restaurant but a cauldron where Johnson and his wife Audra Wolowiec (a sound artist and sculptor) could meld creative interests, often in collaboration with their neighbors. At times, it functioned as a gallery, a print shop, a book bindery, a soup kitchen, a community center, a business incubator, a film house, and a workshop for local teens. No matter what was happening, Johnson and his team of two or three local high school kids always served dinner on Fridays and Saturdays at 7pm: usually, a curry or tagine, along with Medjool date bread and hummus. Ortuzar said, “I think he’ll let you cook your paella here. I told him about you.”
It was hard to believe, but Ortuzar was right. Johnson let me, still a novice cook, take over Friday nights once a month for wood-fired paella and live flamenco music in the candlelit front studio; it was an idea I’d envisioned 10 years prior, and Lodger helped me bring it to life with no overhead costs. Those nights, like every night at Lodger, were intimate
Leon Johnson with David Moldover of The Newburgh Pottery.
Lodger storefront and free food pantry.
Diners at the bar at Lodger.
Photo by Brian Wolfe
and boisterous. Throughout the dinner service, we drank from an endless stream of wine bottles that customers and friends sent back to the line; we peered through the kitchen curtain as the musicians performed and sang with patrons as they came back to join us for an injection of energy and excitement. As guests petered out at the end of the night, unfailingly, some hung behind to meet at the long table in the backyard. We’d collect all the candles and leftover wine bottles from inside and gather there, sometimes while listening to the night’s most intimate guitar and singing. On one of those nights, I shared a hand-rolled cigarette with Johnson’s son Marlowe, who is a bartender in Detroit. He said, “My dad just creates this wherever he goes. It’s like his traveling circus.”
It wasn’t just me he let in. When Johnson cleared that threshold, he helped countless people. Local potters and carpenters showcased their work in the space, a Japanese chef tested out her pop-up concept there, and a local Newburgh cook named Chuck Bivona, who had worked at restaurants around the country and even done TV cooking competitions, all in service of his vision to open an Italian pasta shop, like the one his parents used to have, finally opened his shop, Bivona’s Simply Pasta on Liberty Street, last year after returning home and getting his footing with a few cooking events at Lodger.
An Open Door
Perhaps no one benefitted as much as the local high school kids who worked those hundreds of wild nights. They were paid a living wage and gained experience, vision, and access that is hard to come by. When school shut down during Covid, the school district used the tiny studio at Lodger as a hub to distribute hundreds of bagged lunches to kids who ordinarily depend on free lunch during the school day. During one of our many afternoons prep cooking, Johnson told me, “This only works if it’s part of the community.”
Undoubtedly, the place also became the darling of folks in the local arts community, a group that is changing the city’s face. But while other new restaurants gathered at prominent street corners from another planet, hosting brightly lit parties while longtime locals watched from the windows, Lodger was discreet. It was part of the neighborhood. It was intentionally inclusive. Also, there was the bittersweet promise that it would only be around for a while, as the name Lodger implied.
To run a place like Lodger, with an open door to everyone, required risk and trust. As such, the place became a pure reflection not just of Johnson and his family but of the community. And it felt good being in that environment. It was the best place to eat in the area for five years without ever being a restaurant.
Guests at Lodger.
Johnson with Lodger staffers Hanif, Fredy, and Eileen.
Photo by Brian Wolfe
Staff preparing Moroccan tangines of chicken and oxtail with vegetables from Little Earth Farm in Pine Bush.
The best spot in town for healthy & fresh.
Now the building has been sold and the final dinners have been scheduled; Lodger has to vacate. I’m not sure what will happen with the space, but the locks will be changed, and the keys Johnson distributed to dozens of collaborators all over the city won’t fit the keyhole. But, if the place is to become something unrecognizable, I think it’s fitting that Lodger was the last tenant. Johnson honored all the ghosts, decorating the blue room with images of the original shopkeepers and using the sign, not of Lodger, but of the undertaker that once held his office there. And then there are all the shrines. I never asked Johnson about it, but he seemed to practice witchcraft or at least have a very participatory interest in Faustian mythology. As diners, glowing and invigorated, tasted spoonfuls of luscious eggplant and olives, they’d ask themselves, “Are we all under some spell? Is he charging these crystals and putting them in the food?” I’m not one for hokum, but I hope there is a spell to protect this place against future malintent. After the last dinners this past winter, when the door closed, dried maple leaves skittered over the bluestone and onto the threshold to preserve it again. Maybe this one room in a fast-changing city will keep its soul.
As for Johnson, we met in early August during a storm under a semipermanent canvas round tent in his backyard a few blocks from the old Lodger. Sitting around a massive custom wooden table amid the rain, he said, “None of us have mentioned [Lodger] once since giving the keys back to the landlord.” Of those who started working at Lodger during their high school years in Newburgh, one is now an apprentice with a world-class chocolatier; another is a bookbinder and printer; another is off to medical school; another is preparing to go to college on an athletic scholarship.
Going forward, Johnson says, “the mission continues,” a mission he describes as “a collaborative creative enclave in proximity of food.” Johnson said. “It’s not Lodger 2.0; it’s called Anathemata, and I expect it will have the life of a mayfly.” While diners won’t have access to weekly dinners, groups of 10 to 14—which thus far have been assembled by a spice hunter, a troupe of Shakespearean actors, and a group of writers from Bard College— gather for dinners or events. As before, those looking to collaborate with Johnson can contact him through Instagram (@lodgernewburgh). The remaining team of now-veteran staff is the backbone of ongoing projects in the tent and far afield. They have hosted pop-ups in Kerhonkson and Kingston, including an ongoing Sunday residency at Flying Goose Tavern, while devising plans for destinations as far ranging as Cape Town and Berlin. The “traveling circus,” as Johnson’s son called it, it seems, will keep rolling along.
Lodger staffer Kayvon.
sips & bites
Sorry, Charlie
523 Delaware Avenue, Kingston
The owners behind Poughkeepsie’s neighboring establishments Goodnight Kenny bar and Hudson & Packard pizzeria have teamed up to open Sorry, Charlie in Kingston. The group upgraded the intimate space inside and out, adding new tilting windows that open out for passersby to peep inside. Bar snacks range from mixed nuts to potato beignets to pimento cheese dip ($6-$12), but the 12-inch pan pizzas are an easy favorite. For drinks, try the signature Charlie’s Sour—bourbon, lemon, and angostura, topped with an edible wafer-paper design ($12). Non-alcoholic slushies are available ($8); add a nip of booze for $4. Two rotating draft beers and a selection of bottles and cans combine local favorites and domestic brands. @sorrycharliekingston
Nansense
2 Eliza Street, Beacon
With stunning turmeric-toned Zellige tiles, a live-edge walnut counter, brass stools, penny tiles, and hanging rugs, the recently opened Nansense in Beacon is swankier than your standard burger bar. But touches of neon, legible signage, and playful art keep the Afghan restaurant casual. The chapli kebab smash burgers are made with ground beef with diced onions, tomato, cilantro, and traditional Afghan seasoning. Order yours single, double, or triple ($7, $11, $15) and add masala fries for $5. The small bites include crispy bolani (stuffed flatbread) with a mint-garlic yogurt dipping sauce ($11) and banjan, an eggplant dish with a tomato and onion base, topped with the same yogurt and served with naan ($10). The customizable bowls come with a base of basmati rice, kabuli, and salata, and you can choose either beef, eggplant or bean as your protein ($15-17) and designate your spice level. Add sauces and flatbread for extra. The $25 Mehmani plate is perfect for sharing. @nansensenyc
The Governess Bar
1 Main Street, Poughkeepsie
Waterfront dining and drinks are back at the ice house in Poughkeepsie’s Waryas Park. The Governess offers cocktails and signature twists on classic American food, like its two sister restaurants in Queens, The Baroness and the Huntress. Dishes include their lava macaroni with six cheeses and pretzel crumbs ($16); maple sriracha wings ($14); and burgers like Le Ranch with shaved ribeye, Swiss cheese, buttermilk ranch, a runny egg, and barbecue sauce ($22). The restaurant is working with local vendors like Earth to Table to bring in Hudson Valley ingredients. And though not local, the seafood offerings are a nod to the waterfront setting and include a family-style seafood boil ($72), a raw bar platter of clams, oysters, and shrimp ($36), and pan-seared salmon ($37).
Thegovernessbar.com
Circles
502 Union Street, Hudson
After moving upstate to work at Lil’ Deb’s Oasis, chef Tray Tepper found himself craving New York bagels. His sourdough bagel pop-up turned brick-and-mortar, Circles, aims to fill that hole while working with local purveyors for a concept he cheekily calls “farm to bagel.” For example, the New York-style bagel with Ben’s cream cheese, shiso, cucumber, red onion, and chili crisp. Nova lox ($7.25) and marinated white anchovies ($5) can be added to any creation. If you’re hungry for some non-bagel fare, there’s Chaseholm yogurt with granola ($12) or the girlboss salad with local greens, shaved farmers market produce, and poppy seed vinaigrette ($12).
Xcirclesx.com
The Rolling Cones
22 Jansen Avenue, Kingston
Music references abound in Alex Lauri and Nikki Freihofer’s take on the classic ice cream truck—a retrofitted vintage Airstream trailer, which they parked next to Kingston Standard brewery in late July. From a small window the couple dishes out soft serve ice cream cups, cones, and sundaes with extras like homemade crunchy coating toppings, fresh fruit, and Rice Krispies. Though the menu will grow, for starters they’re offering artisanal soft serve (made with local dairy) in chocolate and vanilla flavors. Try the decked-out Lady Marmalade sundae, which comes with vanilla bean soft serve, tangy lemon curd, lemon bar chunks, and white chocolate pearls; or the Mint Condition, with chocolate soft serve, homemade Thin Mint magic shell, Oreos, and chocolate crispy pearls. The ice cream trailer is open Thursday through Sunday.
@therollingcones.ny
—Marie Doyon
Dining Guide
It’s no secret that dining in the Hudson Valley, Catskills, and Berkshires is one of our favorite pursuits—and yours, too!
In addition to our coverage of the buzziest new eateries, our monthly Dining Guide is a place for all those well-loved spots that have been on the scene for years to highlight what keeps their fans coming back for seconds.
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Located in a historic steamboat repair shop in Kingston’s Rondout district, Ole Savannah offers up a heaping helping of Southern hospitality with a distinctive Hudson Valley twist.
Think classics like fall-off-the-bone barbecue, chicken and waffles, and fried green tomatoes, as well as globally inspired dishes like misomarinated salmon filet and pho. Add to that a fan-favorite Sunday buffet brunch spread, a diverse menu of hand-crafted cocktails, and some of the best waterfront views of any restaurant around, and there’s a reason Ole Savannah has been a Kingston go-to since restaurateur Dave Amato opened its doors in 2015.
With its exposed beams and high-vaulted ceilings that evoke the Rondout’s storied shipbuilding era, Ole Savannah has also become a favorite venue for intimate weddings, anniversary parties, bridal showers, and just about every other kind of shindig imaginable.
Brickmen Kitchen + Bar
47 N Front Street, Kingston (845) 882-7425 Brickmenkingston.com
In 2023, Amato and Jessica Mino opened Brickmen Kitchen + Bar in Kingston’s Uptown district as a love letter to the city’s rich history. The name Brickmen was inspired by its prominent 19th- and early 20thcentury brickmaking industry and Amato’s grandfather Joe, who worked in the brickyards before becoming a restaurateur himself.
The globetrotting menu at Brickmen, designed by consulting chef Certified Master Chef Dale Miller, is comforting yet refined. Mini mac Kobe sliders, lobster spaghetti al limone, bricked jerk roasted half chicken, Korean BBQ ribs, and a seafood and sushi bar are tailor-made for pairing with craft cocktails that borrow ingredients from an equally diverse international pantry. Sunday brunch is also a can’t miss affair at Brickmen, especially when enjoyed on the outdoor deck with quaint views of the neighborhood below.
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Studio.
Peekamoose Restaurant & Tap Room
8373 State Route 28, Big Indian (845) 254-6500 Peekamooserestaurant.com
Pioneers of the farm-to-table movement, The Peekamoose Restaurant’s menu changes daily with the seasonal bounty, reflecting the close relationships that the Mills have established with local farmers. Chef Devin Mills grew up in the Catskills and spent his formative years working for some of the top eateries in Manhattan. Nightly bonfires, imaginative cocktails, and locally sourced farmhouse cuisine make this spot a must-visit. Peekamoose is celebrating their 20th year of being a Catskills destination.
Carter’s Restaurant and Lounge
424 Main Street, Beacon (845) 743-6527 Cartersbeaconny.com
Swing by Carter’s Restaurant and be greeted by the father-and-son owners, Jonathan Lombardi, who welcome everyone like family. The restaurant offers exceptional food and drinks, served by a dedicated staff in a beautifully designed space. The menu now includes vegan options, along with a creative cocktail list. Carter’s is also a perfect venue for hosting an event and Chef Lombardi will personally create a menu that caters to all tastes.
Soul Fire Sanctuary
Joy Brown’s yearly anagama kiln firing in Kent
By Mary Angeles Armstrong
Photos by Winona Barton-Ballentine
Every year, as the summer draws to a close, ceramicist Joy Brown lights a fire. That fire is at the heart of her forest sanctuary, as well as the heart of her yearly traditional clay firing and the community of like-minded artists that has grown during the almost 40 summers since its inception. “ The firing is a core part of my work,” says Brown. “It ’s where clay comes to life. It ’s exhilarating, stressful, and thrilling all at once and it ’s a communal effort that brings people together.”
Nestled within the lush embrace of woods, her fiveacre property outside Kent, Connecticut, is where nature and human creativity converge. Her Japanese-inspired home and studio blend into the rocky landscape and her whimsical, earthy sculptures peek out of the greenery. At the edge of her property, the traditional 40-foot kiln is the site of the property ’s yearly firing, a ritual that brings young and old, friends and newbies, artists and the merely curious, to participate.
The cycle of the summer firing dominates her entire year. “It ’s like a farmer ’s cycle,” she says. “During the year we prepare the wood and clay, sculpt and throw pottery, and then load the kiln and fire it. Then comes the harvest. By the end of fall I move back toward the studio to start crafting again.”
The interior of Joy Brown’s ceramic studio. The hand built, two-story structure was one of the first that she and her exhusband Al McClain built on the property from local timber. The open first floor of the studio has room for her more traditional pottery work as well as the human-like sculptures she’s exhibited all over the world. The structure evolved over time. “It’s been a work in progress for 40 years,” says Brown. “All of it is in varying degrees of finished and unfinished.”
Thrown into the Fire
Brown’s connection to East Asian cultures runs deep. Brown’s grandparents lived in China, where her father grew up and lived for 40 years. After World War II, he moved to Japan to found and run a hospital and brought his young family with him. Brown spent her formative years outside Osaka where she had the space and freedom to play. “As far back as I can remember, I’ve played with clay and fire,” she says. She and her brother would spend their free time digging clay from the earth, then experimenting with fire, burning the clay shapes she formed.
Brown moved back to the US for college but then returned to Japan, where she took an apprenticeship with Toshio Ichino, a 13th-generation potter. During the day, she was a traditional apprentice, but in the evenings she began experimenting with her own practice, throwing and re-throwing forms to internalize the process. The traditional apprenticeship was extremely challenging, akin to a trial by fire. However, it had a transformative effect on her work and identity as an artist. “I developed an intuitive connection to
the clay and the capacity to be present in the process,” she says. “It ’s the process that ’s most important and the quality of attention that we bring to it. The pieces that result reflect the spirit and skill. “
Afterward, Brown studied with potter Shigeyoshi Morioka and developed a creative rhythm that shapes her work and life today. “He’s a free spirit in clay,” says Brown, who also learned from Morioka’s low-temperature-kiln techniques by working with his anagama, an ancient woodfired kiln. “I learned a way of life from him,” says Brown. “Clay and wood fire became a center of my life. “
Earthen Where
Brown returned to the US in the early 1978 and moved in with ceramicist Paul Chaleff in Pine Plains. The region’s working artist communities and long tradition of supporting creative endeavors suited her. She soon rented a studio in the nearby Webatuck Craft Village, where she lived worked as a potter for five years, developing her distinct creative style. “At that time these little figures,
and
property’s five
acres. The two have been friends for years, and Griffin helped with some of the initial construction work during Brown’s early days on the property. Now he utilizes the wood shop (in the background) to work on projects. He also restores classic cars. The property’s three buildings are all heated with wood stoves.
Brown
her partner Jimmy Griffin enjoying the
forested
Top: The design of the 1,500-square-foot main house reflects a blend of simplicity and elegance. Handmade woodwork and Japanese-inspired rooflines from Brown’s childhood in Japan add both beauty and practicality. The southernoriented home benefits from sun exposure in winter. The deep, overhanging eaves keep the home naturally cooler in the summer. “Living and working here has been an incredible journey,” says Brown. “It’s a place that nurtures the soul and inspires the spirit. I can’t imagine being anywhere else. “
Bottom: Brown’s anagama—or traditional Japanese tunnel kiln—is the heart of her property, where fellow potters gather each August for the kiln’s firing. Many people helped her build the 30-foot-long kiln, which is four feet wide and four feet tall. And, since its construction in 1985, many more people have joined in to help load work into the interior, stair-like shelves, maintaining the 2,300-degree wood fire for nine straight days, then unloading the work afterward.
first puppet heads then animal forms, started to evolve,” says Brown. “ Those figures are the ancestors to the sculptural forms that I make now and install all over the world.”
Brown met and married woodworker Al McClain and the two made their way to Kent, where her childhood friend Shin Watari owned land. Watari offered to sell them five undeveloped acres for $10,000—well below its market value but an amount she could afford. “It was basically a gift,” says Brown. “He admired my work and has bought and commissioned pieces from me over the years since.” The land itself, completely wild woods and rocky outcroppings, was well off the main road. However, Brown sensed that they could forge something special from the landscape.
Many Hands, One Sculpture
“We built the house and studio like planting seeds,” says Brown. “ We allowed it to grow and evolve, finding just the right spot for each cupboard, each window, each door.” They began that first year with their two-story cottage, focusing on hand-building a functional, aesthetically simple structure. They constructed the 1,500-square foot house from rough wood beams and topped it with a steep Japaneseinspired pitched roof extending into deep overhanging eves. Inside, the first floor had a bare-bones, open-concept living room and kitchen, as well as a bedroom and bathroom. A simple wooden staircase leads upstairs, to a loft style bedroom with vaulted ceilings. Next, they built Brown’s studio—the same architecture, but within a smaller footprint. In
the studio building, the first floor was left open for Brown’s kick and electric wheels, work bench and walls of shelving for tools, clay, and drying racks. Another wooden staircase leads to an office with vaulted ceilings, McClain finished the rudimentary structures that first year, but had to cover the unfinished windows and doors with plastic and left the interiors unfinished.
Two years later, the couple built a third structure on the property—this one a woodshed with another unfinished second-story space. “ We’d been part of a meditation group for years,” says Brown. In order to create a shared meditation space on the forested property, the group pitched in. “Our meditation group helped finish the second floor of the wood shop with sheetrock,
painted walls, and added windows,” says Brown. “It became a little beaming light to the rest of the property, inspiring us to finish.”
Other friends pitched in to finish the home and studio. “Many people came in to help,” says Brown. “ Together, we eventually added real windows and doors, proper interior floors, and finished the interior sheet rocking—it felt luxurious.” Inside the house, they added an open kitchen with a small wooden island and left exposed wood trim and exposed rough edged wood beams. The loftstyle bedroom upstairs soon became home to the couple’s son. Friends also helped finish the building exteriors with shiplap siding. “It ’s all very functional,” says Brown. “But it ’s also funky, wild, and wooly, and simple and elegant, too.”
In the southeast corner of the home’s openconcept living room, the dining area enjoys morning light and a view to the woods. “We built the house and studio like planting seeds,” says Brown. “It wasn’t all laid out in the beginning. We allowed it to grow and evolve, finding just the right spot for each cupboard, each window, each door.”
The home’s second floor has a vaulted ceiling with exposed beams. Brown’s son, Ryo Brown-McLain, a painter and landscape designer, grew up here and lives nearby. “Growing up here, he developed a deep connection to the land and an appreciation for nature,” says Brown. “We learn things from our kids. He put a hidden camera on our compost pile and I realized the amount of wildlife we share the property with. He really taught me to be much more aware of the ecosystem here.”
The broadest selection of the biggest trees and plants in the Hudson Valley.
The broadest selection of the biggest trees and plants in the Hudson Valley.
and plants in the Hudson Valley.
The broadest selection of the biggest trees and plants in the Hudson Valley.
The broadest selection of the biggest trees and plants in the Hudson Valley.
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Valley.
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9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
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Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
9W & Van Kleecks Lane, Kingston, NY (845) 338-4936 AugustineNursery.com
FULL-SERVICE NURSERY • CUSTOM LANDSCAPE DESIGN & INSTALLATION • STONE YARD & HARDSCAPING WATER FEATURES • IRRIGATION • LIGHTING • RETAIL SHOP & MORE
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Spring Hours: Monday–Saturday, 8am–5pm and Sunday, 10am–4pm
FULL-SERVICE NURSERY • CUSTOM LANDSCAPE DESIGN & INSTALLATION • STONE YARD & HARDSCAPING WATER
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Brown’s meditation group pitched in to help finish a dedicated shared meditation space above the property’s wood shop. Over the years the property has become a community crossroads bringing in people of all ages, backgrounds, and cultures. It inspired Brown, along with her friend Denny Cooper, to found the non-profit Still Mountain Center. “The mission is to bring people together in the arts, through education, innovation, and exploration,” she says. “There’s also an international element where we share crossculturally about art.” Paintings by her son hang on the walls.
The Fire Next Time
Brown and McClain’s marriage eventually ended and McClain moved to a property nearby. (The two remain friends and continue to support each other ’s creative endeavors.) A longtime friendship with woodworker and tinkerer Jimmy Griffin, who had also added his carpentry expertise during the early stages of building, evolved, and Griffin moved to the property with Brown, adapting the wood shop and adding a covered garage where he restores classic cars.
The beating heart of the property, the wood-fired tunnel kiln, came in 1985. The anagama, or tunnel kiln, is 30-feetlong with ascending interior steps and a four-by-four-foot mouth. Based on the traditional clay-firing technique Brown learned as an apprentice, the style originated in ancient China and was brought to Japan in the fifth century. The kiln’s construction, like the rest of the property, involved the many helping hands of community. “I built it with the help of whoever I could get to show up,” says Brown. “Plenty of friends and my ex-husband got sucked into building this.”
Since its construction, the kiln’s yearly firing has evolved
into a ritual that brings fellow sculptors and potters, friends, and students to the property to participate. “ We have a whole community of people that comes together to help fire the kiln,” Brown explains. “It ’s a crossroads of wonderful, creative artists and people from all walks of life.”
The cycle begins long before the kiln is lit. Brown spends the colder months planning, crafting her small figurative sculptures and pieces for her large sculptural forms in her studio. Over the years other ceramicists have added their own pieces to the mix, and in the month before the firing they come together to prepare. Loading the kiln is an intensive process that spans several weeks with each piece carefully placed to optimize its exposure to heat and ash.
The actual firing takes nine days and requires round-theclock tending to stoke the flames and maintain the interior temperature. (As well as seven cords of wood.) Afterward, the kiln and its contents need a week to cool, before being carefully unloaded. While the art leaves, and the participants go home, Brown hopes they take a piece of a fire they ’ve all stoked with them. “ Through the process our creative spirits grow and are nurtured and challenged,” says Brown. “Many people come for that and it ’s why I’m here.”
As mega-warehouses proliferate around the region, worsening air quality for local residents, the Clean Deliveries Act is making its way through the Assembly, an attempt to regulate vehicular emissions.
The MegaWarehouse Next Door
The Health Effects of E-commerce
By Hillary Harvey
It was at the first town council meeting of 2024 in Gardiner that two Plattekill residents took to the floor to ask councilmembers: “Are you folks aware of this mega-warehouse that’s proposed for your border?”
The 50.93-acre parcel that was purchased by Modena Developers LLC is zoned light industrial, so Plattekill’s Planning Board, the determining body, deemed the use “as of right” with specialuse permit, which allowed them to ask for public input, a traffic study, and require a zoning variance for the building height. Even though the project was large for a town with a population of 5,600—a 451,050-square-foot trucking terminal and warehouse facility with 75 tractor-trailer loading docks—it was the first Councilmember Michael Hartner had heard of it. “They were against it,” Hartner says of the Plattekill speakers, “and they were asking for Gardiner’s help to stop it.” Hartner says a big concern was that the applicant’s traffic study estimated 200 trucks a day traveling on Route 44/55 between Modena (Route 32) and Gardiner (Route 208)—a hilly state road with limited sight-lines. Unlike a traditional warehouse used to store excess inventory with a few deliveries per day, mega-
warehouses are meant to have waves of fulfillment that keep the flow-velocity high.
Both Hartner and Gardiner Town Supervisor Marybeth Majestic mentioned concerns about traffic, safety, and the town’s infrastructure. Some intersections on Route 44/55 don’t have the turn radius for an 18-wheeler, and trucks have gotten stuck. Other intersections have recently been deemed dangerous by the Ulster County Transportation Council. A nearby bridge has a 17-ton weight limit that would preclude its use by the warehouse. “Trafficwise, it would be a nightmare for all of Gardiner’s residents,” says Majestic, “negatively affecting the quality of life for all of us.”
BIPOC Communities Hard Hit
Earlier this year, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF)—a research arm of the statewide ElectrifyNY coalition—announced their study’s finding that one in four New Yorkers live within half a mile of a mega-warehouse, including 457,000 people in the Hudson Valley, according to their analysis of relative Senate and Assembly districts. A mega-warehouse is a building between 200,000 to over a million square feet designed for major regional distribution and storage centers. There are
currently 2,400 leased warehouses in New York that are at least 50,000 square feet.
Because legacy local zoning codes don’t address the changing definition of warehouses, these high-traffic fulfillment centers for e-commerce are disproportionately clustered in communities of color and low income, with Black residents 101 percent more likely, Hispanic/Latino residents 66 percent more likely, and low-income residents 54 percent more likely to live within that halfmile range in the Hudson Valley and more likely to suffer from the truck-related pollution that’s associated with and generated by these warehouses.
EDF’s report focuses on nitrogen dioxide emissions, with reference to other pollutants like particle pollution from fine particulates, and sulfur dioxide. “What we find is that nitrogen dioxide pollution, which is one of the main pollutants released by trucks, contributes to large numbers of childhood asthma cases in areas across the country,” says Sam Becker, Project Manager for Global Clean Air at EDF.
Asthma fundamentally changes a child’s life— physically, emotionally, and academically. It is the leading cause of missed school days and has been linked to diminished school performance. The
report details that Black children are nearly nine times more likely to be hospitalized for asthma and five times more likely to die from it compared to non-Hispanic white children. With reports now released for Illinois and New Jersey, since New York’s was released, Becker says, “EDF is ultimately trying to understand how communities across the country are being impacted by the pollutants that they have no choice but to breathe, and to make the case that the status quo is one that needs to shift.”
The Regulation Problem
ElectrifyNY is a statewide coalition of environmental advocacy groups that have been leading the charge when it comes to passing what could be the first statewide antipollution rule for warehouses: the Clean Deliveries Act. They wrote the act in coalition, and have been sitting down with elected officials to win their support. Last month, the law was passed in the State Senate at the end of legislative session, co-sponsored by Senator Michael Gianaris of Queens (called “the Amazon slayer ” for his work to dissuade the company from setting up HQ2 in Long Island
The Clean Deliveries Act is an effort to regulate emissions overall because, while point source
pollution, such as from a smokestack or factory, is measured and regulated, emissions from megawarehouses is from an aggregation of indirect sources (trucking activities concentrated in a relatively small area, similar to bus depots or airports), and that’s unregulated.
“And when I say unregulated, the status quo is such that we don’t even know where the facilities are, how many there are, which communities they’re impacting, or what their emissions are,” explains Alok Disa, Senior Research and Policy Analyst at Earthjustice—a public-interest litigation arm of ElectrifyNY. The act establishes an indirect-source review process to ensure this growing industry does its part to meet emissions standards and be compliant with climate law. And while Southern California has an indirect-source review process for one of its air-quality districts, New York could be the first to have one statewide.
Disa says the Clean Deliveries Act would plug massive regulatory holes related to measuring emissions from mega-warehouses. “Whereas right now, the situation seems to be the developers and mega-corporations dictate the terms, I think there should be a more collaborative and proactive approach to this giant industry because the impacts are so pronounced,” Disa says. “There should
be a planned process where, if we’re all going to participate in e-commerce and benefit from it, we all should shoulder some of the costs as well.”
The Regulation Problem
Large-scale fulfillment centers are trying to address what’s known as the last-mile problem— that point in the supply chain where it becomes expensive and logistically challenging to deliver fast, free shipping. There’s incentive, from a supply chain standpoint, to build more warehouses and to site them closer to where people live, to achieve those fulfillment times. “No one could have anticipated just how fast e-commerce blew up,” says Jaqi Cohen, the Director of Climate and Equity Policy for Tri-State Transportation Campaign—an advocate for decarbonization in the transportation sector within ElectrifyNY. While e-commerce was already on the rise, the pandemic shifted buying habits in a profound way. “And so we’ve seen a massive increase of online purchasing, and that means a massive increase of same-day, door-to-door deliveries to people’s homes, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And the Clean Deliveries Act came out of the demands of community members who are impacted by that, particularly in Red Hook, Brooklyn.”
The Amazon Montgomery warehouse is more than 1 million square feet, built on a 187-acre property on Route 17K in the hamlet of Rock Tavern. Hundreds of trucks roll in and out each day.
Cohen says there are many ways to tackle the issue, from choosing sustainable shipping options, such as grouping items into one shipment and not choosing same- or next-day delivery when buying online, to phasing in expectations that the shipping industry invest in clean energy technologies or newer models of goods movement. “We’re not saying that fleets have to be zero emission the day after the bill is passed; there will be a phasein period. But this is where the industry is headed, and this is where the transportation sector as a whole is headed.”
EAT PLAY STAY
In addition to better transparency about mega-warehouse permitting, siting, and ownership, the bill would create an emissions-reduction plan requiring warehouse operators to implement one or more of the following: acquiring zero-emission vehicles and charging infrastructure, installing solar panels and/or batteries on-site, considering alternative transportation modes for incoming or outgoing trips where appropriate and with on-site worker input, or be sugbject to fines. It would apply to both new and existing mega-warehouses, and would enable a facility-by-facility review to create an opportunity for public scrutiny, so the needs of the freighting system can be assessed holistically along with how to manage demand. “We’re seeing these facilities pop up closer and closer to people’s homes and into communities where maybe they thought they would never be built,” Cohen says, “and so people are calling their legislators and they’re worried about what this means for their health and their livelihoods.”
“There should be a planned process where, if we’re all going to participate in e-commerce and benefit from it, we all should shoulder some of the costs as well.”
—Alok Disa,senior research and policy analyst at Earthjustice
For opponents of the mega-warehouse proposed for Route 44/55, there’s frustration about the lack of clarity around the project. They say that even though the traffic study speculated the number of vehicles involved, the developer has not identified who the tenant of the building would be or what they would be storing there, which makes it hard to assess the impact. Even Richard Gorres, Plattekill’s Chair of the Planning Board doesn’t know. Though they’ve been asked, the applicant has been vague about who will use the facility, and it’s a question they’re not required to answer.
The siting of mega-warehouses is subject to local laws, and the regulations around industrial zoning can allow for development to occur without special permit or public input or even traffic studies. Environmental advocates say polluting industries tend to exploit a community’s need for jobs and lack of political capital.
Gardiner put together a committee of various experts who went through the SEQRA (State Environmental Quality Review Act) application line by line, divvying up research items. The committee concluded the project would have extensive environmental impacts and submitted a 75-page letter requesting Plattekill’s Planning Board make a positive declaration on SEQRA, to trigger additional review. And it worked; the proposal is now in what Gorres calls “a stalled process” while the developers voluntarily conduct seven to eight studies before another public hearing is held and the Planning Board makes its declaration.
Plattekill’s zoning code was last updated in the aughts, but Gorres says, “No one thought in 2007 there would be a need for all these warehouses.” Gorres works at a warehouse, and he says if you take a ride around Montgomery and Maybrook, it’s nothing but warehouses. “Everywhere you drive, you see FedEx, Amazon, and UPS trucks; it’s the life we’re having now.”
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Kaleidoscopic City Hudson
Photos by David McIntyre
8:45am train to New York City
Opposite Top: The Hudson-Athens Lighthouse celebrates its 150th anniversary this year.
Established by an act of Congress in 1874, the beacon that has guided vessels through the Hudson River's hazardous Middle Ground Flats has a crumbling foundation. It's currently on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places. The not-for-profit Hudson-Athens Lighthouse Preservation Society is working to raise the funds needed to halt the lighthouse’s demise.
Opposite Bottom: Hudson mainstay Norman Douglas writes poems-to-order on his Smith Corona typewriter in the shadow of a decommissioned church at 448 Warren Street.
Driving down Hudson’s main artery and taking in the shops and buzzy restaurants, I’m always reminded of something Melissa auf der Maur, cofounder of Basilica Hudson, said to me in 2019: “It wasn’t until the antiques dealers, the gays, freaks, and artists showed up that things started to shift. The level of momentum has been remarkable.”
It wasn’t always thus, of course. When Alana Hauptmann opened Red Dot in 1999, there were only a few businesses open on Warren Street like Carrie Haddad and Steiner’s Sports. It’s now the longest-running restaurant in the city, and Hudson has one of the busiest Amtrak stations in the state, ferrying passengers back and forth to Manhattan. On Friday afternoons, you can watch as the train disgorges hundreds of people trailing their wheelie suitcases behind them. The population of this small city of nearly 6,000 can double on summer weekends.
Our man on the scene, photographer David McIntyre, lives just outside the city, so Hudson is basically home turf for him. These photos are just one slice of a town that continues to reinvent itself.
—Brian K. Mahoney
The
at the Hudson Amtrak station, which is one of the busiest in the state.
Top: Freya and Melany Dobson, cofounders of Hudson Cannabis, a regenerative cannabis farm. Their products are available at 130 legal dispensary locations across the state.
Bottom: The former Riverbend Mercantile space on Warren Street in Hudson reopened in July as Riverbend Dispensary, an adultuse legal cannabis dispensary run by Rudy Huston and Ed Glickman.
Opposite: For over 40 years, Claverack Motocross has operated on a historic family farm minutes from downtown Hudson, hosting races for riders of all skill sets.
One the remaining fishing shanties along the Hudson River known as the Furgary Shacks. The structures, built on state land with mostly found materials, were used from the late 19th century until 2012, when people were forcibly removed. Demolition of the shacks began earlier this year.
Mike Burdge and Diana DiMuro opened Story Screen Cinema in the former Madison Theater location on Fairview Avenue. Story Screen has three screens, plus a bar and arcade.
FREDERIC CHURCH’S OLANA
The Hudson Depot Lofts under construction on 7th Avenue. Twenty percent of the 63 apartments will be for moderate-income households and the remaining 80 percent are earmarked for workforce housing. The bottom floor will houses retail businesses.
Percussionist Bobby Previte performing his one-man show “No Bells, No Whistles” at Hudson Hall on July 27.
Left: Multidisciplinary artist and musician, Venus de Mars, best known as a singer-songwriting transgender rock star and leader of the glampunk trans-band Venus de Mars and All the Pretty Horses, performing at Park Theater on August 3.
The Dunn Warehouse is a 5,500-square-foot former manufactured gas plant on the Hudson waterfront which is being adapted into flexible spaces for a range of activities that amplify local educational, cultural, and wellness-focused organizations and small businesses. The Dunn Warehouse team: Gabriel Katz, Samantha Siegel, Suanny Upegui, Caitlin Baiada, and Sean Rolland.
Left: Caitlin Curtin and Harry Franklin with the NY19 Votes Coalition campaigning on August 14, the birthday of Social Security, at the 7th Street Park.
Right: Alana Hauptman, owner of Red Dot, inside her establishment, which opened on Bastille Day in 1999 and is the longest-running bar/restaurant in the city.
Hudson
Pop-Up
Portraits by David McIntyre
We timed our pop-up portrait shoot at Henry Hudson Waterfront Park in Hudson to coincide with the city's Waterfront Wednesday event on August 7. Hundreds of Hudsonians congregrated on the lawn, taking in the music, dancing, and the languid evening air. Thanks to Elena Mosley of Operation Unite for getting us a spot.
Top row: Four generations of Hudsonians: Shaquila Walthe with Denver, Dakota White, Gloria Stewart, and Debbie Walthe; Dmitry Wild, musician and writer;
Adriana Tampasis, musician and composer; Adam Weinert, dancer; Alexandre J. Petraglia, President of the Hudson Business Coalition.
Bottom row: Alix Becker, Farmstead Hudson, and David Becker, artist; Anna Mayta, choreographer at Mayta Fusion Dance; Armen Donelian, director Hudson Jazz Works; Cat Tyc, development manager at Hudson Hall with Agnes; Beth Feingold, professor; Ben Forman, senior analyst at Vermont Energy Investment Corporation and Shannon Neault, climate scientist at National Audubon Society with Rico and Suave.
Top row: Jeffrey Lependorf, executive director of the Flow Chart Foundation; Zach Lee, Fern Woodworking, Caroline Lee, Hudson Hall with Evie and Frankie Lee; Sean Carrillo, artist/writer and Bibbe Hansen, artist/writer; Vanessa Baehr, Hudson Sloop Club with Dezi Baehr; Chelsea Arend, writer/teacher with Eloise Grant; Victor Mendolia, real estate broker at TKG Real Estate.
Second row: Caitlin MacBride, artist with Clark Varno; Thomas DePietro, Hudson Council President; Pauline Decarmo, artist; Shannon Greer, photographer and Charlotta Janssen, gallerist, Hudson Milliner Art Salon; Chris Freeman, Private Public gallery; Nancy Nelson with Elvis and Sophia.
Third row: Tom McGill, Circle 46 Gallery; Mikel Hunter, fashion
curator and shop owner; Robin Rice, gallerist/photographer at Robin Rice Gallery; Richard J. Gillette, interior designer and yoga teacher; Rik Letendre, artist/writer/ musician; Rachael Que Vargas, artist at Rachael Que Vargas Studio;
Bottom row: Hudson Sloop Club: Vanessa Baehr, Shanique Alladen, Sam Merrett, Sarah Dibben, Adam Weinert, Shaina Marron, and Ngounga Badila.
Top row: Graham Taylor, graphic designer with Ollie; Gwen Gould, artistic director/conductor at Hudson Festival and Ed Grossman, JSL Computer Services; Dezjuan Smith; Peter Spear, Future Hudson with Iris Spear; Elena Mosley, Operation Unite NY and Gregory Mosley; Gayl DePriest.
Middle row: Justin Weaver, mayoral aide/ADA coordinator for City of Hudson; Jennie Portney, speech language pathology and Moses Asili; Katherine Moore; Keith Nelson,
entertainer at Bindlestiff Family Cirkus; Kamal Johnson, mayor of the City of Hudson with Rio Johnson; Kelley Quan McIntyre, makeup artist with Elsa.
Bottom row: Gretchen Kelly, artist; Luis Accorsi and Haleh Atabeigi, curators at the New Gallery Hudson; Ifetayo Cobbins, Operation Unite NY; Ivy Dane, Rebus; Jane Ormerod, Park Theater literary host and Peter Darrell, realtor and events coordinator; Kristan KeckFarmer, owner of Wm. Farmer and Sons with Ariana Smith and Wyeth Farmer. Join us for the September issue launch party on Thursday, September 12 from 5:30-7:30pm at Upper Depot Brewing, 708 State Street in Hudson.
Jo
Hudson Area Library trustee; Diane McCrady, Zion Peterson, Mike McCrady, and Lilyanne McCagg; Sam Stegemann, operations director at Columbia-Greene Habitat for Humanity; Jane Ehrlich, Open Studio Hudson.
Princess Wow, comedy storyteller/hat designer.
Weckler, artist.
Bottom row: Daniel Murray, Human Capital.
Top row: Lulu Dibben; Ron Jarvis with Roxy; Sherry
Williams,
Second row: Operation Unite NY; Ruby Nedd, Ursula Laban, Leah Laban Gomez; Rivka Gorelick, product photographer with Aspen Stern; Mindy Fradkin aka
Third row: Kira Schneider, Audrey Schneider, Ella Dibben, Sula Williams; Seth Rogovoy, writer and Linda Friedner, Penguin Random House in-house counsel; Wayne Francis, teacher aide, Hudson City School District; Sher Sullivan Stevens, artist; Chad
Top row: Laura Powers and Rudy Huston, Riverbend Dispensary and Tri-Hudson Realty with Rico; Leah Laban-Gomez, Operation Unite NY and Bryan MacCormack, community organizer at Columbia County Sanctuary Movement; Lisa Durfee, Five and Diamond Vintage; Liz Lipkin, interior designer; Liz Lorenz, assistant director at Susan Eley Fine Art; Lucy Nordin, farmer and Em Watson, photographer with Clover.
Middle row: Maggie Jessen, Hudson Cannabis greenhouse supervisor; Marta Eisner, Mia Jones, Eli Jones, Cameron Jones and Evelyn Jones of Jonesin’ Food Truck; Mary Ann Johnson and Duane Stanton, Hudson Valley Agricultural Business Development Corp; Melissa Macaluso and MaryVaughn Williams, Hudson Clothier; Mellie, studio assitant, Lydia Rubio, artist, Annabelle McLennan, artist.
Bottom row: ; Autumn Tampasis, artist/ haircolorist; Tara-Marie Coyne and Cosette Coyne; stilt walkers from the Bindlestiff Cirkus Youth Program:; Serria McGriff, Serenity McGriff Phillips, Ahliciya Dempsey, Karel Hills, Naomi Robinson; Rachel Arnwine, videographer and Thomas Norway, professional dog watcher/ handyman.
Columbia County Road Trip
At first glance, Columbia County is all farmland and quiet villages bounded by the Berkshires and Catskill Mountains. Thanks in part to Hudson’s magnetic energy, the rest of the county has continued to blossom in recent years—offering visitors everything from world-class performing arts and historic museums to lovingly restored accommodations, farm-to-table experiences, and craft beverage destinations.
FilmColumbia
Crandelltheatre.org/filmcolumbia
FilmColumbia 2024, Columbia County’s 10-day premier film festival, returns this October 18–27 at the historic Crandell Theatre in Chatham. For the past two decades, FilmColumbia has screened the very best upcoming and pre-release American and international films. It is now an acclaimed, nationally recognized film event featuring in-person Q&As with filmmakers and stars. If a film screens at FilmColumbia, there’s more than a good chance that it will go on to be nominated for one of the industry’s top prizes. Tickets open to the general public on October 12. Visit their website for more information.
Bill Arning Exhibitions / Hudson Valley
17 Broad Street, Kinderhook Billarning.com
Gallerist Bill Arning is known for curating early exhibitions of celebrated artists like Marilyn Minter, Glenn Ligon, Cady Noland, Felix GonzalezTorres, Gary Simmons, Mary Weatherford, and John Currin. BAE’s exhibition program today extends the curatorial values of his first exhibitions in 1984 at White Columns, prioritizing the interweaving of work that challenges convention with a respect for the profound positive effects that result from visual pleasure. Actively mixing artists based in the Hudson Valley with sympathetic makers from around the world, BAE has become a cherished go to gallery for those looking for the most stimulating art being made today.
Photo: Spencer House Studios Austerlitz, NY
Little Apple Cidery
178 Orchard Lane, Hillsdale (518) 610-1345
Littleapplecidery.com
Little Apple Cidery is a beautiful destination for people of all ages. Enjoy a fine selection of ciders under an apple tree at their seasonal Orchard Bar and Market. Open Saturdays and Sundays 1-6pm. Be sure to join them Sunday, October 13 in celebrating their 12th annual Ciderfest!
Art Omi
1405 County Route 22, Ghent (518) 392-4747 Artomi.org
Art Omi presents the work of contemporary artists and architects, featuring large-scale artworks in nature and exhibitions in the Newmark Gallery. The Sculpture & Architecture Park has over 60 works on view, with pieces added or exchanged each year, ensuring no two visits are ever the same.
Art Omi welcomes the public to its grounds free of charge.
Nestled on the banks of the Hudson River, Clermont is one of the Hudson Valley’s oldest surviving estates. Take a tour of the 250-year old historic mansion, enjoy the 500-acre grounds and meticulously restored gardens, and explore the new exhibit in the Visitor Center. Visit their website to plan an adventure.
Old
Dutch Inn
8 Broad Street, Kinderhook (518) 203-3347
Theolddutchinn.com
Experience unparalleled rural refinement at Old Dutch Inn. With nine king and queen guest rooms, all with ensuite baths featuring marble finishes and select rooms with cast iron soaking tubs, Old Dutch Inn defines Upper Hudson Valley luxury lodging. Named Outstanding Small Property of the Year by the NYS Tourism & Hospitality Association.
The Abode of the Message
5 Abode Rd, New Lebanon (518) 794-8090
Theabode.org
The Abode is a retreat center founded in 1975, offering classes, retreats, and gatherings that create time for restorative experiences surrounded by nature and the beautiful Mount Lebanon. Visit this beautiful Shaker site with gardens, historic dining and meeting rooms, and hiking trails on over 340 acres. Book a wedding, team building, individual retreat, or private event. For more information visit their website at Theabode.org or join their mailing list by writing frontdesk@theabode.org.
Supporting community wellness through organic farming and the arts, Mettabee Farm & Arts hosts classes, personal and group retreats, camps, seasonal festivals, concerts, performances, dances, weddings, birthdays and other celebrations, a community garden, a “giving garden,” a flock of Shetland sheep, bees, and a small store of locally made products (yarn, honey, maple syrup, candles, and more). It is also a lovely place to go for walks. For more information and to get on the mailing list, please contact them at info@mettabeefarm.com.
Jimenez Lai, Outcasts from the Underground , 2024.
Photo: Bryan Zimmerman. Courtesy of Art Omi.
The Final Shoot
“Marilyn Uncovered” at Sohn Fine Art
By Albert Stern
Artists have been captivated by Marilyn Monroe since US Army photographer David Conover took a picture of 18-yearold Norma Jeane Mortenson while on assignment in a California munitions factory in 1944.
Artworks inspired by Monroe seek to make sense of her complicated inner life, but prints of her sourced directly from film—a magical emulsion that captures reflected or enveloping light, leaving behind a shadow of space once occupied—are as close as one can get to seeing her in the flesh.
Such is the case with the exhibition “Marilyn Uncovered” by acclaimed artist Bert Stern (1929-2013), on view at Sohn Fine Art in Lenox, Massachusetts, through September 30.
Captured over the course of two weekends in mid-1962 at the Hotel Bel-Air in Los Angeles, the work was to become a multi-page fashion spread in Vogue magazine. Tragically, the actress died six weeks later from a barbiturate overdose at her home in Brentwood, and the feature, which had already been sent to press, was canceled, reedited, and released that September as a memorial.
Just three years Monroe’s junior, Stern had a young family at the time of the infamous shoot. One photograph in the exhibition, Marilyn and Bert in the Mirror, is a reflected portrait of the artist and subject on a bed, backlit by a mountain of sunlight. Strewn around the mirror are pieces
of photography gear and cables, high heels, a wine bottle, and a half empty glass of red wine; Monroe dangles her glass over the bedside, laughing. It’s easy to imagine these two 30-somethings discussing relationships, children (or Monroe’s brutal pregnancy losses), childhood, fame, age, and art once the alcohol calmed both their nerves.
“He liked to leave the details because he wanted to reveal her as a person,” says Trista Stern Wright, Stern’s eldest daughter. “When she got in front of the camera, she was just so unbelievable— she embodied the [experience] so fully.”
Only two images in the exhibition feature a fully clothed Monroe wearing what look like designer dresses—expected for a fashion editorial. The rest depict her clutching roses, sheer scarves, bed sheets, and beaded necklaces to her otherwise bare chest, skirting the line between vulnerability and exploitation. Known throughout her life as a sex symbol, Monroe was not one to shy away from exposing her body before a camera. She was a pin-up model in the 1940s, posed nude for photographer Tom Kelley to pay the bills, leveraged sexpot roles to propel her film career, and returned to nudity in the filming and still photography for her last, unfinished movie, Something’s Got to Give
As she honed her negotiating skills with studio executives, Monroe also exerted influence over her
printed image. She would review photographers’ proof sheets, or contact sheets, and cross out images she didn’t like with a red marker. One of Stern’s contact sheets—a series of 24 thumbnail portraits that animate Monroe like Muybridge’s galloping horse—is featured here. Another print, titled Crucifix II, is perhaps the most arresting image in the exhibition. Monroe’s own markings create a second veiled layer, inadvertently evoking violence, trauma, and martyrdom.
Crucifix II and other images in “Marilyn Uncovered” may be familiar to devoted Monroe fans. Stern published hundreds of previously unseen photographs from the shoot as a book, The Last Sitting, in 1982, and the complete set of over 2,500 photographs in 2000. But these grainy, mesmerizing prints have a power and resonance that reproductions simply do not.
Additionally, half the works are embellished with crystals and jewels, a collaboration with Stern’s two former assistants, Lisa and Lynette Lavender. While more iconic than intimate, these “jewel-toned” prints, each a one-of-a-kind work of art, capture yet another facet of Monroe’s persona: the starlet.
“He definitely tried to put his own specific stamp on things,” says Wright of her father’s creative legacy. “He made [his photographs] unique and special.”
Marilyn and Bert in the Mirror, Bert Stern, 1962. Bert Stern’s photographs of Mariyln Monroe are on display at at Sohn Fine Art in Lenox, Massachusetts.
Your Upstate Experts
Hudson. This stunning 4-bed, 3.5-bath contemporary home sits on 15.6 private acres with jaw-dropping views of the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains. Meticulously transformed to fit seamlessly into the landscape, with salt pool, two ponds, cantilevered sunset viewing deck. $3.85 Mil. Call Greg Kendall, 954-804-9085.
Catskill. A stately 6-bed, 3-bath 1850’s farmhouse on 2 acres, meticulously restored with many of the original historic details intact. Set up currently as a 2-family, could be converted easily to a single family. Close to local hot spots, and 15 minutes to Hudson. $849,000. Call Martin Salerno, 917-734-8161.
Lanesborough. Located in the heart of the Berkshires with 102 acres on a pristine nearly uninhabited lake. Camp Mohawk is ready for it’s next incarnation as a resort, condos, homes. Includes 5 historic register buildings and numerous cabins. $3.5 Mil. Call Lisa Bouchard Hoe, 413-329-1162.
Athens. An outstanding Hudson River property, just over the Rip Van Winkle bridge from Hudson. With 40+acres, pool and gently sloping grounds, eye-popping River views. The Italianate style home has 11 beds and 6 baths. Development and family compound possibilities. $4.95 Mil. Call Lisa Bouchard Hoe, 413-329-1162.
Canaan. Unique and beautiful round home with separate round guest house. Tastefully restored, very private, down a long driveway. 3 beds, 2 full baths. Great wrap-around deck, potting shed. Quiet and peaceful, minutes to the Berkshires and close to Chatham. $729,000. Call Martin Salerno, 917-734-8161.
Hudson. This lovely 1860 Italianate Revival home is set on 30 acres with pond and frontage on the Stockport Creek. The 3,656 square foot house has been beautifully maintained, with 5 beds and 2 full baths. Close to downtown Hudson, Kinderhook and Chatham. What a beauty! $950,000. Call Janet Kain, 917-709-8724.
Quiet Transformation Sullivan County
By Melissa Esposito
Sullivan County has always held a reputation for idyllic respite. Decades ago, that might have meant a countryside escape from city heat with days by the lake and nights spent around a fire pit to the soundtrack of buzzing summer bugs. But today—well, it still does. Even with the addition of Wi-Fi, no matter how spotty, the sentiment remains the same: Sullivan offers the peaceful allure of an unrushed pace. Yet the region has also gradually evolved to become known as a destination for high caliber arts, award-winning dining, artisan-run shops, and other barely hidden gems, just as much as it has already been loved for its picturesque vistas and wide-open spaces.
“There have been a lot of significant transformations in many of our towns and within the Sullivan-Catskills as a whole,” says Roberta Byron-Lockwood, president and CEO of the Sullivan-Catskills Visitor Association. “For instance, many of our businesses are independently owned by makers, artisans, and artists, so each visit is unique and you can find these truly one-of-a-kind treasures. It’s smart growth; we’ve become a region
known for its beauty as well as its immersive experiences for visitors.”
As most Hudson Valley and Catskills areas have seen, there’s been an influx of new residents, both permanent and part-time, since the pandemic. But even pre-Covid, Sullivan’s growth has been more of a steady momentum than a surprising surge.
“We’ve had walkable main streets, picture-perfect mountains, and that unique sense of place where people are generally open and welcoming, but the region has been discovered and appreciated more and more by people who are increasingly looking for that simpler life,” she says. “So now, towns like Roscoe, Livingston Manor, Wurtsboro, Mountaindale, Monticello—everyone is enjoying this wonderful growth. But we’re not being over-developed with big-box stores. You’ve got your Dollar Generals, but most of these towns have their own anchors, like the Forestburgh Playhouse, Bethel Woods—each making their presence known as a centerpiece to towns that already have so much more to offer.”
The Delaware River is a popular spot for whitewater rafting, with rapids ranging from class I to class III.
Hospitality Boom
But even without tourism-drivers like The Kartrite, a massive indoor waterpark-resort that’s open year-round, Sullivan has a long history as a vacation destination that visitors often decide to call home. “We’re a little county the size of Rhode Island, but also one of the biggest secondhome destinations, and that continues to grow,” ByronLockwood says. “It’s that wanting for a simpler life. Around here there’s a mindfulness of farms and makers, and we have miles of beautiful trails, but we also have some of the finest James Beard-nominated restaurants, yet far from the city rush—our version of a traffic jam is the local tractor parade. You can have an economical family-friendly visit, or the most luxury weekend getaway that you can imagine.”
And even the luxe experiences have a range, from the casino and nightlife thrills of Resorts World Catskills, to the earthy wellness retreat Hemlock in Neversink, which opened last year on 230 acres. Co-founders Simms Foster and Kirsten Harlow Foster own Foster Supply Hospitality, which currently maintains five hotels including Hemlock, one restaurant, and Single Bite, a nonprofit working to provide aid for regional food insecurity. “Hemlock is similar to our other properties, but more at the luxury level; although, it’s hard for me to call it luxury, because it’s not that sort of white-marble retreat. It’s nature focused, and very humble, but very intentional,” says Kirsten Harlow Foster.
The pair started in the hospitality industry with the opening of the Arnold House, a boutique hotel, in
Livingston Manor in 2014. But their local roots go much further back. While for some, building a life in the region has been about the escape; for others, it’s about the return.
“Our kids are fifth-generation Sullivan County,” she says. “Simms had experience in hospitality, restaurants, and nightlife for hotel companies in the city, and I’m an economist by trade, and we were visiting here often, looking to find ways to be more full-time up here to raise our kids. We started the Arnold House in a nascent market, but were very encouraged by what we saw, and how that slow growth continued to spark and encourage new businesses to invest in the area. Which, I feel like we even used to take for granted, until realizing that elsewhere it’s getting harder to find that quintessential mom-and-pop-shop town.”
And although the region is gaining more attention in the past few years, hospitality and happenings have long been a part of Sullivan’s story. “In the 1960s there were more hotel beds in Sullivan County than any other county in New York, with more than 60,000 hotel rooms—but when we got married in 2013, we were struggling to put together lodging options for just our 110 guests,” Foster explains. “Every weekend we’d come up and we knew that if we loved it, others would too, and maybe more hospitality could help the local economy—more jobs, new businesses. It’s still an area where you can just get away from it all and be immersed in beautiful mountains, lakes, and meadows, but there’s an eclectic mix of sophistication and local community here that makes it such a rich experience.”
The Museum at Bethel Woods focuses on the history of the Sixties counterculture and the 1969 Woodstock festival.
The Catskills,
Sundays | Sept 1 - Oct 6 | 11AM - 4PM
Bethel Woods Center for the Arts, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit cultural organization located at the historic site of the 1969 Woodstock festival, is committed to building upon our rich
Natural Beauty
A prime example is the picturesque drive through the Bashakill Wildlife Management Area) that leads to Bashakill Vineyards in Wurtsboro. The drive takes you through the preserve, which, spread among more than 3,000 acres, encompasses the largest freshwater wetland in southeastern New York. The journey feels as though you’re in the middle of nowhere, as its narrow, winding roads subtly approach the 10.5-acre farm-winery, which opened in 2015 and unobtrusively incorporates its natural surroundings into its own storybook setting: Walking paths that lead uphill to patio seating overlooking the mountains, cozy wooded nooks near a hosta- and wildflower-lined pond, and covered seating under a large rustic pavilion just steps away from a snack shack offering savory delights like pad thai shrimp tacos.
Winemaker Paul Deninno is from another multigenerational Sullivan family, and he has witnessed the area’s slow-churned growth and embraces it. Although Bashakill Vineyards is a farm-winery that appreciates old world winemaking, they also utilize innovative techniques, such as creating an on-site wine-production barn fully insulated with geothermal heating and cooling. Here,
they produce a variety of dry reds; dry, off-dry, and semisweet whites; sparkling wines; rosé; skin-contact (orange) wines; and infused flavors, the latter of which are made with ingredients either grown on-site, like sumac, or from local purveyors. To make their popular lavender wine, for instance, Deninno says they use five varieties of lavender from Winterton Farms in Bloomingburg—owned by lifelong Sullivan residents Deninno and Samara Ferris and located “right over the mountain” from the winery. “The lavender wine was my wife’s idea; she’s also our chef. I’m a wine purist and was initially totally against the idea of infusing anything in our wines,” he says. “But the lavender really works so well with the Cayuga [grapes], which already have apple and melon flavors that blend in perfectly.”
He also notes that a variety of distinctive businesses have sprung up over the years, like Double Up, a transformed double-decker bus-turned-cafe with a commercial kitchen on the lower level and seating up top. He cites the newer businesses as examples of positive ongoing change. “My mother was raised up here and told me stories about how beautiful the area was when she was a kid,” he says. “I’m so happy to see the revival of the Catskills. Each year it gets better and better.”
Sullivan County is chock full of world-class spots for trout fishing, like the Willowemoc Creek.
Mark Brown Happy Hour (Independent)
The cover of Mark Brown’s third album captures him standing on the recently emptied bed of a pickup truck overlooking a landfill. Work weary, he stares down, considering the fate of two items yet to escape the seagull-scavenged death of an out-of-sight, out-of-mind throw-away culture. Will the remaining roof shingles and yellow metal sign succumb to their rancid grave of destiny? All we know is that the novelty token from someone’s now-defunct basement bar has inspired the title of his new album Happy Hour. An apt example of life’s happenstance ironies sunning the seeds of art’s fodder.
Most people might discard pontifications on the the oddities of the daily grind, but Brown finds inspiration from these musings and breathes this life into his lyrics and music. Contemplations include the scratching of lottery tickets and subsequent spontaneous dance parties in Stewarts, the regional acceptability of deer targets in the yard, the smell of gasoline hands, inertia, PCP, Jesus, and the Shawangunk Ridge. The 14 songs were recorded by Dean Jones and Ken McGloin, both of whom join in on various instruments, sprinkling their magical music dust. Mark Murphy, Dean Sharp, Dakota Holden, and Kate Mullins add seasoning to the tasty, fried-chicken rockabilly and some of the more earnest and acoustic-leaning tunes with flavoring like Americana a la Cake or a gentler Giant Sand. The makeshift band flexes everything from raunchy disco bass lines to lyrical pedal steel, funky banjo, and many versions of sweet acoustic mayhem punchy with that all-nighter moonshine aftertaste.
—Jason Broome
Zan and the Winter Folk New Morse Code (Independent)
Zan and the Winter Folk are just that: wintery. They’re well bundled, wrapped in layers of folk warmth, celebrating and lamenting the outside world through cozy interiors. Based in Troy, the folkrock outfit is guided by the vision of Zan Strumfeld, who creates, through delicate arrangement, proud vocals, and her band’s mature instrumental lightness of touch, transporting folk rhapsodies for the rambling, the heartbroken, and the pensive. New Morse Code, released in June 2024, can be icy, too, with brittle banjo playing on tunes like “Hungry Eyes,” and crystalline backing vocals adding a glorious fullness on tracks like “Your Kingdom.” The album’s title track showcases the band’s sweeping orchestration abilities, with deft interplay of banjo and guitar, swelling string lines, and tasteful brushed drum kit, all falling like a steadfast amen-chorus around Strumfeld’s under-the-covers vocals. Grittier numbers also appear, like the guitar-forward “Stay Put,” wherein a bolt of electricity jolts the band to life, striking a fine balance between homespun acoustic folk, and electrified attitude.
—Tristan Geary
The Stabbing Jabs
The Stabbing Jabs (Beast Records; Reptilian Records)
The debut of punk/noise/heavy rock supergroup the Stabbing Jabs is an unstoppable tsunami of aggression, riffs, and glorious sleaze. Vocalist Peter Aaron (Chrome Cranks, Chronogram arts editor), guitarists William G. Webber (Chrome Cranks) and Chris Donnelly (Gang Green), and drummer Andrew Jody (Barrence Whitfield & the Savages) share roots in the Cincinnati punk/ hardcore scene (UK-born bassist Jamie Morrison joined after the LP’s recording). These 11 aural grenades put forth a convincing case for the Queen City as an underappreciated epicenter of rock action.
“Radiation Love” references early (best) Black Flag, with stinging fuzz guitar lines and Aaron’s release-the-id howling. “Uptown Blues” dials down the speed, but ups the intensity; a slinky, sleazy, dirty amalgam of American grime. Pair with a bottle of Mad Dog and espresso chasers.
Jeremy Schwartz
SOUND CHECK | Frank Bango
Each month we ask a member of the community to tell us what music they’ve been digging.
Lately the Bearsville schedule has been informing my musical choices, which is interesting because the iconic Milton Glaser logo is burned in my memory from the dB’s and Todd Rundgren albums of my youth. Some of my earliest memories included Rundgren’s Something/Anything and A Wizard, a True Star, so they’ve been in heavy rotation as we prepare to welcome Todd back to the theater. Billy Bragg’s recent visit had me doing a deep dive back into his Talking to the Taxman About Poetry. I’ll always crank up Levi Stubb’s Tears or The Warmest Room. He’s definitely a hero. I’m also now a recent Ratboys convert; I hadn’t heard of them until their recent performance here. I wasn’t expecting much melody from a band named Ratboys, but I’m definitely hooked now that I’ve discovered how tender and sweet their songwriting is. I hope they come back soon. I even bought a T-shirt! Winged Wheel’s recent performance prompted
me to download their first album No Island, from Bandcamp. It works beautifully as a soundtrack when driving around the Ashokan Reservoir. Classy music, classy band.
I’ve got a 30-minute commute from my house to the theater, and when I’m not streaming music I resort to the three CDs I keep in my car. One is a compilation of Charlie Rich from his Smash Records sessions, which simply makes any drive more fun. I’ve also got an old burned mix CD with Rockpile, lots of Kinks, The Bitterest Pill by the Jam, Jeff Buckley’s version of “Lilac Wine,” and some great girl group stuff. The last one is The Convincer by Nick Lowe, which to me is a perfect album when I need to drive and clear my mind. And to be perfectly honest, occasionally I roll down the windows and listen to Frank Bango’s Touchy/Feely. Which I wouldn’t have to do if more of you people out there would also do it.
Frank Bango is a singer-songwriter and the recently appointed general manager of the Bearsville Theater. He lives in High Falls.
Return to Wyldcliffe Heights
Carol Goodman
HARPER COLLINS, 2024, $18.99
What really happened at Wyldcliffe Heights? Once a psychiatric hospital for “wayward” women, it’s now the private estate of an aging, reclusive author who recruits young junior editor Agnes Corey to help her transcribe a sequel to her 30-year-old hit novel. Things get very dark indeed as Agnes begins to uncover unsettling secrets about the past and about her own life. Two-time Mary Higgins Clark-award winner Goodman, who teaches creative writing at SUNY New Paltz and the New School, is incomparable at surrounding likable heroines with mind-bending suspense.
The Lonesome Threesome
Hawley Hussey NAUSET PRESS, 2024, $24.99
“One day, The Husband brought me a present. They were a petite peroxided blonde, with a name that sounded like a condiment.” Thus begins the snarky and hilarious saga of a “throuple gone awry” set amid the bright and not-so-bright lights of Los Angeles, delivered in microbursts of sleek, evocative prose and peopled with extraordinary characters. The Husband is fated to become What’s-His-Name fairly early on. Hussey lives in Ulster Park now; we highly recommend staying on her better side lest one end up immortalized under a wickedly clever pseudonym.
Collector of Lapsed Times
David Appelbaum BLACK SPRING PRESS GROUP, 2024, $19.95
What are the things we pick up and keep, rattling loose in our pockets or ensconced on a shelf? A collection is a story of sorts, whether it’s stones or shells, coins or books— and sometimes, collections seem to form of their own volition. Appelbaum, who teaches philosophy at SUNY New Paltz, illuminates the web that binds the material and the mental, the instant and the eternal, in this collection of poems that slide into the brain like honey and demand to be touched, tasted, and considered.
As True as the Barnacle Tree, Second Edition
Anita M. Smith
WOODSTOCK ARTS, 2024, $14.95
Smith, born to a wealthy Philadelphia Quaker family, flung off the socialite life in 1912 and headed to Woodstock to study at the Art Students League, renting a room in a boarding house, hiking out to pretty spots and coming home with impressionist landscapes. She would become an important chronicler of the arts scene and the Herb Lady of the Catskills, founding a successful gardening business. This book, originally published in 1939, pulls together ancient, indigenous, and up-to-theminute herbal lore and seasons it with history.
Band People: Life and Work in Popular Music
Franz Nicolay
UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS PRESS, 2024, $19.95
Rock stars rely heavily on the side players whose names aren’t on the concert marquee or the album cover, but without whom the song would definitely not remain the same. Nicolay, a Bard professor and a keyboardist with the Hold Steady, digs deep into his conversations with them and reveals lesser-known realities of what the life’s really like on the road, on the stage and in the studio. He’ll be at the Morton Library in Rhinecliff for a book event and discussion with Joe Hagan on September 26 at 6:30pm.
—Anne Pyburn Craig
The Bulgarian Training Manual
Can a book hold untold riches, promises of health, strength, beauty, and spiritual aspirations? The Bulgarian Training Manual, the tome for which Kingston-based author Ruth Bonapace named her novel, certainly prophesies all these things, even if we get mere whiffs of its contents, in the form of diet advice and a weekly workout chart. To a group of bodybuilders, it becomes a kind of bible; they argue about the different versions of the ad hoc, super-secret manual—a thick stack of photocopies held together by a binder clip. It lands in the hands of Christina (“Tina”) Acqualina Bontempi, an unsuccessful real estate broker living in a floodprone basement apartment in Hoboken who had been raised by her grandmother, or so she thought.
Tina interacts with a roster of zany characters whose interactions affect her fate in large and small ways. Her ex, Steve (later, Big Steve), gives her the manual to begin with; he has undergone a transformation from OCD nerd to a gym star. Her boss, Joe Fox, a macher who’s not only a crackerjack real estate broker but an ex-pilot with Rat Pack style. A mysterious man in a shearling hat who seems to pop up with regularity on various continents. Baba Yaga, a Bulgarian advocate and dealer of a lauded “dietus mirabilis.” Tina pinballs between this cast, following fate, hunches, and her desire to achieve fame through her bodybuilding.
One of the hilarious dietetic secrets to bodily perfection is eating communion wafers, preferably the gluten-free kind. They should be eaten with extracts from arugula-fed snails for maximum effectiveness to match the benefits of performance-enhancing drugs. (Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.) The demand for the wafers explodes, stressing the factory and sisterhood that makes them. Word spreads, and lines to take communion swell with the swole, along with the donation baskets filled with guilt-driven cash.
Head-snapping events unfold. Joe Fox hustles Tina to the airport and onto a cargo plane, which he flies to Bulgaria. She encounters a German inn-keeping couple, and Catherine of Siena, part of the #Persecuted#Womens#Collective order, and her erstwhile sister. She eventually comes across the Ancient Gym, where some dweebs are trying to piece together a complete version of The Bulgarian Training Manual. She is compelled to flex her bicep and strike a pose, which elicits applause and reactions telling her she is the real thing, sent to restore the Ancient Gym to its glory and flesh out the manual. Eventually, Tina discovers the identity of her purportedly true biological parents, one of them an A-list bodybuilding icon. She is tasked with completing, or reworking, the training manual, which would be authentic as it would emanate from her DNA.
The story culminates in the First Annual International Poetry Body Slam, where entrants strike poses to pre-recorded music while volunteers read original poetry only in Bulgarian, English, or Esperanto—the ultimate melding of body and mind. If that seems wacky, consider some of the events at the recent Paris Olympics such as speed climbing, breaking, and artistic swimming (with all props to the athletes, to new eyes they seem pretty wild!). The Olympians also serve as real-life examples of people of widely varying backgrounds focusing on competing and training toward reaching the games while working typical jobs. Not unlike Tina and The Bulgarian Training Manual
Bonapace’s plot leaps from here to there; sometimes it feels as if she’s simply reveling in the power and play of words for fun, remarking on alliteration every now and then, toying with different forms, from song lyrics to scripted dialogue. Quotations and references from classics to pop culture abound, from Shakespeare, Neil Gaiman, Thomas Kincade, Rachel Ray (presumably intentionally misspelled to avoid legal ramifications), “The Hokey Pokey,” to “Rocky and Bullwinkle.” Her satirical yet freewheeling style allows for out-there ideas to enter the narrative to weave a sometimes mind-boggling, often entertaining story of self-discovery, self-help, and minor celebrity.
—Susan Yung
Ruth Bonapace
We all need the sun. We all need the sun. But everyone loves the moon. Everyone loves the moon.
—Piper Jaden Levine (2½ yrs)
(originally published July 2007)
The Cat Who Edits
The cat who edits what isn’t loved is motivated by its own greed for the spotlight. It’s been asleep, dreaming of the red pen it’d paw at when it heard a new poem in the hall. Without even asking, it pounces and takes over, removing any trace of what was there before. When you see the cat, it is time to run and hide. It will keep you up all night and work you like a slave; it doesn’t need a screen or a fat stack of paper. It has only one idea: to take your poem apart and put it back together again as something else. It won’t stop until it thinks it’s done enough damage— till you’re tired of fighting with every word he adds or deletes; till there’s nothing left that can be changed again, nothing left that is yours alone, It is his.
—Claudia Wysocky
Mending the Cracks
Life wears on me, expecting me to stay put in its shack. The dreary walls close in; I feel the trembling pressure, but I am the stone wedged within a stubborn street crack.
We delve into risky exploits which were void Hoyle’s knack, so, I never cared for creatures of lust and rapture. Life wears on me, expecting me to stay put in its shack.
The squeak of rain boots exposes me to a flashback where I am drowned in the greed of my culture, but I am the stone wedged within a stubborn street crack.
I wish to be as genuine as an old, well-read paperback to comfort creatures of curiosity, but I always say, “yes sir.” Life wears on me, expecting me to stay put in its shack.
Where is the exit? I wish to wander the wilderness to track tonics and remedies to clear my palate of sickened sugar, but I am the stone wedged within a stubborn street crack.
Filthy sweetness clings to my gums leaving a rotting plaque, but soon I will slim the hurdles and grow my strength into a fester. Life wears on me, expecting me to stay put in its shack, but I am the stone wedged within a stubborn street crack.
—Alyssa VanPelt
In May 2007, in these pages, I published a made-up song I heard my daughter singing when she was not yet 3 years old. I was struck by it so much that I felt it called for presenting it here. (Reprinted below.) That led to many issues in which I included the poems and words of younger poets. Some months I have work to present, and some I don’t, but I know there are always many, many young (grade school through high school) and many other really young poets out there saying and writing remarkable poems, and so I’m reinviting all of you young poets and all of you parents, teachers, and friends of young poets—listen, write ‘em down and send ‘em in. I’d love to see, consider, and possibly publish these remarkable pieces on these poetry pages (and on our website). Email poetry@chronogram.com and include your age or your young poet’s age. Thank you.
—Phillip X Levine
Grateful
He was grateful for the gentle purring of his cat. The joyfulness of the sun after a season of rain. The triumph of the bees following the return of the flowers. He brightened the world with his laughter and a smile as wide as the heavenly hereafter. Brightening up the darkest shadows with alizarin blues and greens. His brush illuminating forests and pools of fallen water. The yellow flower wavering in the sun. The brusque advance of a passing wind. The brittle rejoinder of a broken branch. He was grateful for his love’s slumber after relentless nights of thunder. The caress of her hand across the wrinkles of his world. The tumult of a new born baby climbing into the lap of the world
—Bruce Weber
Aftermath
Spreading wife’s ashes on her garden I think will be so hard but laugh as a breeze sprinkles them around and back up into my face like sooty kisses evenly distributed light on air I breathe and believe come in the sun with me one more time.
—C. P. Masciola
Autumn Trees old with cold bare blue bark
shed red yellow years.
—Daniel W. Brown
Untitled
I know we took it back
But I still reach
For the keys
In the mornings especially I don’t know why that is….
You don’t find your way to my dreams
As frequently as you once did
I’m still seeking a goodbye
It seems we made it formal somewhere We seemingly managed to do it all
From you sleeping on your floor
So I can have the couch
To love making
To sharing food, money
And most importantly
Our lives
Please
Just tell me goodbye
And let us die
—Penny Scofield
Ultimate Loss
In the corridor ahead two men guiding a gurney bearing a black bag
I was too late
Passing the nurse’s station all sorrow and madness a nurse looked up and said Some of us have never had that
—Clifford Henderson
Ode to Kamala
If only this dawn
Of a New Presidency
Might mean the dawn Of a New Beginning: Might mean a melting Of frozen hearts—
A New Compassion; Might mean a broadening Of narrow minds—
A New Enlightenment; Might mean an embrace Of different ways—
A New Tolerance; Might mean a loosening Of old strictures, Old scriptures—
A New Faith.
Someone once prayed “Father, forgive them,” And was crucified; Someone once preached “I Have a Dream,” And was crucified; Someone once proclaimed “Imagine,” And was crucified.
Haven’t we done enough harm?
We’ve no time left to crucify. It is time, at long last, to sanctify: To sing a psalm in unison, In an all-encompassing embrace, In this holy chapel of Earth, In consecration not of The One, But of Each One— The full congregation; To gather close in welcome Of our glorious differences, Knowing that differences Deepen and diversify us; To weave of us all
A coat of many colors, Stitched together as one: Myriad beautiful tones, All harmonizing, all blending, All dazzling, all sacred. And all of the same lining.
—Tom Cherwin
Splits
Today I tore a hole in the last pair of grey Hanes you lent me the summer before our senior season of cross country when Cuddy’s was celebrating twenty years of business with ten-cent wings down the street from our cold-water apartment and we spent the summer stacking ninety-mile weeks next to the bones, too tired to keep up with the dirt or walk next door for laundry. A thousand miles of hills and heat bore reverence for faulty pipes and shared underwear, laughed about over pitchers of Miller on Monday nights after an easy twelve up Oakwood Drive and deepened the next morning, flinging sweat in the mud along the Wallkill during cruise intervals at paces now foreign to legs that rip through remnants of exception. Tomorrow I’ll try to return them at the last place I saw you, rolling ten on your own down Dubois in the sun, if I can find the words that will take me back, they sound just like our breath, they pound the way we shook the earth with every summer step.
—David Lukas
Blue Dress Beneath her ocean blue dress waves full of stars gently break.
—Ryan Brennan
Grandmothering for Dummies
Buy some WD-40. Tighten bolts, the seas are deep; Keep a lookout for your whale Keep a weather eye: The forecast promises tears.
Get friendly with your crinkly eyes, That’s you, in your looking glass, surprised. Most days they call you Grandma Ishmael; On difficult days you may be a GrandMoby Dick, or Avast Ye, Mad Nanny Ahab!
Your kids, who “Sail the ocean blue” aboard the Pinafore, with their lively crew, believe your anchorage will do. Do you?
Keep a Ship’s Log. Observe your sailors navigate, and laugh, and splash, and dive; You tried to convey your water wisdom; You pray they don’t drown.
Some have. Swallowed into whirlpools, in their all-weather wetsuits, they winnow below, around your hull. Remember when Mommy rinsed your hair in the tub? You loved that. See her swimming with the others whom you’ve loved.
Each storm, Captain— Braving thundering winds in a small boat; Giving birth; Later, getting them to school in a blizzard that first day of the bone marrow transplant of their Daddy ; —primed you for every next blow.
Check your bilge, Water will be always wanting to penetrate; Everyday check your anchor chain, Captain, Anchors Away! Is each degraded link as secure as can be?
—Jean Churchill
July 2009
Do you recall how gladsome your beating heart When I was imagined before you, A slip of a girl in slip of white Waiting?
Or you could ask me did I not behold The blunt strength of your arms reaching And rejoice?
That you knew every atom I’d delight!
Full submission guidelines: Chronogram.com/submissions
—Karen Savino
Field Experiments
DOWNTOWN UPSTATE THEATER FESTIVAL
September 7-22
Ancramcenter.org/downtown-upstate
Playwright and director Robert
Pine Plains probably isn’t the first place most think of when it comes to the performing arts. A postcardpanorama panoply populated by farm fields, rolling meadows, and the wooded mountain land alluded to in its name, the town and hamlet offer a whiff of fertilizer and the chirping of crickets—not the smell of greasepaint and the roar of the crowd (or vice versa). Pine Plains, though, actually does have some performance-related history: In the 1880s it was the winter home of P. T. Barnum’s circus animals; its actor residents have included Bob Hastings (“As the World Turns”) and Philip Amelio (“Life with Lucy”); and it has the renovated Stissing Center for Arts and Culture, which opened in 1915 as Memorial Hall, a vaudeville theater.
Still, rural it is. And while community productions of “Our Town” and “Grease” likely play well in such a setting, a three-weekend festival of experimental theater might face a challenge. But if there’s one local who’s up for that challenge, it’s Robert Lyons, who ran Manhattan’s legendary New Ohio Theatre for 30 years and is producing the first annual Downtown Upstate Theater Festival, which will take place in the Pine Plains area September 7-22.
“I actually like a good production of ‘Our Town’ or ‘Grease,’” admits the playwright and director, who with his wife, performance artist Leonora Champagne, herself a playwright and actor who will offer a free workshop on solo and alternative performance at the festival, moved to town in 2016. “Theater’s a big tent, and there’s room for all kinds of styles. For us, ‘downtown’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘inaccessible’; it means theater that’s driven by idiosyncratic artists and passion. In contemporary culture there’s a lot more theater and film that uses surrealism and non-linear storytelling than there once was. So you don’t really see people worrying as much these days that they need to be ‘sophisticated’ to enjoy what’s called experimental or avant-garde theater.”
Staged at the Stissing Center and at the Ancram Center for the Arts in neighboring Ancram, the inaugural festival will present three intriguing works: Marguerite Duras’s “La Musica Deuxieme” directed by Jessica Burr (September 7-8); Gertude Stein’s “Plays” directed
by David Greenspan (September 21-22); and Lyons’s “Puzzling Evidence,” which he will direct (September 14).
The selection of the Duras and Stein plays betrays a feminist thread that Lyons admits he hadn’t considered when putting together the lineup. “That’s a good thing but it wasn’t necessarily a conscious decision,” he muses. “It was more because the material itself appeals to me, and because of the directors involved. Jessica Burr is the founding artistic director of noted [theatrical company] Blessed Unrest, and David Greenspan is a legendary downtown director and writer who’s won six Obie Awards.”
Born in suburban Detroit, Lyons earned an English degree from Michigan State University and initially wrote poems and short stories. He got the playwrighting bug in the 1970s upon seeing an Israel Horowitz play performed as the opening act for blues guitarist Luther “Guitar Junior” Johnson and hanging out with the troupe. In 1987 he moved to New York and took a job as the production manager for a play at the Off-Off-Broadway Ohio Theatre. That year he talked the landlord into letting him run the space, an endeavor that lasted for nine years at the Wooster Street site before the building was sold and the operation relocated to Christopher Street in the West Village. There, under the auspices of Lyons’s Soho Think Tank organization, it reopened as the New Ohio Theatre. Over the course of his long leadership of the Ohio and New Ohio (the latter closed in 2023), Lyons oversaw productions featuring such artists as Taylor Mac, Mimi Lien, Knud Adams, Sam Gold, and James Ortiz and companies like the Mad Ones, Half Straddle, and Elevator Repair Service.
A prolific playwright, Lyons is the author of “My Onliness,” “Yovo,” and “Last Gasp of the Liberal Class,” and many other works. His “Puzzling Evidence” is a comedic mini-musical that explores the relationship of two left-wing activists touring their self-described “PostCapitalist Realist” concert program.
“People who haven’t seen much experimental theater shouldn’t be afraid to come check it out,” he says.
“We’re not doing anything crazy or super-experimental. Just come and be open and you’ll have a meaningful experience. We’ll meet you halfway.”
—Peter Aaron
Lyons
Photo by James Estrin/The New York Times
Right: Six-time Obie Award-winner David Greenspan will star in "Plays" by Gertrude Stein.
Photo by Aaron Epstien
Above: Rhys Tivey, left, and Folami Williams, right, star in "Puzzling Evidence."
Photo by B. Krumholz
Cut It Out
“A DYKE CABIN OF ONE’S OWN” AT MOTHER-IN-LAWS IN GERMANTOWN
Through September 21
Danielleklebes.com
Deep in the heart of July, I drove the beautiful back roads of Dutchess County to Wassaic for a studio visit with Danielle Klebes, who, aside from her artistic career, is the programming coordinator at the artist-run non-profit arts organization Wassaic Project. From the moment I arrived, Klebes welcomed me into her world with an open heart and kind demeanor. A lighthearted conversation ensued, all while her bright, neon-hued, psychologically infused paintings and cut-out sculptures vibrated as the backdrop.
Klebes’s family moved about during her childhood, and she was often “the new person in a group,” she comments. She spent her undergraduate years in Florida studying a range of subjects including art (she cites her time in Florida as highly influential and healing). Later she did her MFA in Visual Arts at Lesley University College of Art and Design in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After her years of schooling, Klebes participated in several artist residencies around the US, hitting 48 states while living out of her car (a Honda Element she fondly refers to as Elephant).
In the summer of 2019, Klebes visited Wassaic for the first time and she felt an immediate kinship. Knowing she had to return, she eventually scored her current position. Settling into a rustic home-studio on the edge
of the woods, Klebes has since been producing a series of realist-cum-fantasy paintings and three-dimensional cut-out portraits of friends from all walks of her life. Using photographs as a guide, her studio is teeming with a dynamic social energy and a sense of connectivity among these intriguing characters. “The wooden cutout figures started because I was making paintings about feeling alone in a crowd and wanted to make that into a physical space,” she comments. The layered piles of these life-sized people were a delight to behold, as if coming upon a dreamland filled with fascinating figures who will animate an impassioned story yet to unfurl. As described by the artist, these cut-outs are both documentation and portraiture, they are affectionate homages and “a physical reminder of all of the amazing people I’ve been lucky to spend time with” she says.
Klebes’s art is a heartwarming blend of personal pride (the natural confidence of these characters) and seductive vulnerability (the ways in which these characters look fearlessly into our soul). Where her 3-D pieces isolate the intensity of these individuals, her “crowd paintings” (as she calls them) tend toward groups engaging in shared moments of sensitive eccentricity and intellectual complexity. Klebes’s utopian visions of situations both familiar and strange are intriguingly fun, such as her painting Techno Parade (2018) that depicts a cavalcade of ravishing ravers who appear elated and exhausted by the spectacle of a night spent dancing and drugging. Another work, Bus (2023), features several friends inside a pink-toned converted vehicle, each staring off into space as if caught in a wrinkle in time— their collective soul-searching is palpable. Her receptiveness to narrative pushes her style in
curious ways, and she is a master at reconfiguring quotidian existence into painterly and sculptural pieces that tell terrific tales: Liquor bottles, trucker hats, leather jackets, and motorcycle helmets serve as props that tease out alternative histories. For a time Klebes rented an apartment from a “hyper-masculine” man, and her exposure to his life resulted in her desire to examine, as she puts it, the “borrowed spaces and borrowed objects” of that experience. On view through September 21, her installation “A Dyke Cabin of One’s Own” curated by Elijah Wheat Showroom at Mother-in-Law’s in Germantown, is an authentic encounter with Klebes at her strongest. Featuring playful paintings and cut-outs from Playboy magazines, taxidermy, beer cans, and provocative license plates in a teeny cabin at the edge of the woods, this country-vibe vision of assured lesbians enjoying boisterous times atop motorcycles in works such as Easy Riders (2024) and Let me run with you tonight (2024) is utterly amusing and full of joyful wit. Klebes discloses that “coming to terms with my sexuality” and her exploration of queerness has also been a part of her artistic process.
With Klebes’s art we encounter both the individual and the community, both the private interiors and the public out-with-it performance. Her art celebrates the realness and rawness of the individual—and the crowd—in a way that asks us to join in the moment and consider the complicated layers of love in our own life. When I asked her about all these ideas in a follow-up correspondence, her response was stout: “My biggest secret is to be a fan of art to build an art community and get better at art is to really care about what other people are making.”
—Taliesin Thomas
Figures for the installation "A Dyke Cabin of One's Own" at Danielle Klebes's studio at the Wassaic Project.
Photo by Taliesin Thomas
by Richard Termine
Puppet Regime
“STRANGE THINGS I’VE SHOVED MY HAND IN: THE ADULT PUPPET THEATER OF CABOT PARSONS” AT THE HOWLAND CULTURAL CENTER IN BEACON
September 14 at 8pm Howlandculturalcenter.org
Puppetry is a combination of sculpture, costuming, playwriting, set design, funny voices, and often music. There’s been a quiet puppet renaissance around the world in the last 25 years. “Puppet slams”—similar to poetry slams or story slams—are held throughout the country, where puppeteers present short-form pieces to enthused audiences. (Unlike a poetry slam, there’s no winner.)
In movies, we see puppetry without recognizing it. We think Yoda is an actual extraterrestrial, that the T. rex in Jurassic Park is a true dinosaur.
Cabot Parsons will demonstrate his skills in “Strange Things I’ve Shoved My Hand In: The Adult Puppet Theater of Cabot Parsons” at the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon on September 14.
“In America, we hear the word ‘puppet,’ and we think children,” Parsons remarks. This show is different. No one under 14 will be allowed in the theater. (His puppet
tales are not obscene, but include adult topics like addiction and depression.)
Parsons works with all types of puppetry: marionettes, rod puppets, cloth creatures, and “naked hand puppets”—just a human finger surmounted by a little Styrofoam ball. “I am a writer; I am a performer; I am a visual artist,” Parsons explains. “I not only build my sets, I get to build my actors.”
“Strange Things I’ve Shoved My Hand In” consists of short pieces, each no longer than 10 minutes. Parsons will be joined by Matt Sorenson, who teaches at the University of Connecticut’s MFA Puppetry program, one of two in the country. Sorensen will perform with Parsons on “Ne Me Quitte Pas,” a romantic tragedy told with socks. Bryce Edwards’s Frivolity Hour Tri-OH!, a threepiece group—piano, cornet, and banjo—will provide jazzy interstitial music.
The names of puppets are essential; in a sense, a puppet is its name. (Oscar the Grouch comes to mind.)
In “A Difficult Speech,” a character named Mrs. Eugenia Difficult, a delegate from the Ladies Intemperance Society of Bogs End, England, delivers a diatribe against summer amusements, culminating in “the darkest art of all: puppetry.” At the end of her talk, she notices Parsons manipulating her, and realizes with horror that she herself is a puppet. “My puppets have a lot of existential crises; I’m not sure what that says about me,” Parsons
reveals with a laugh.
Parsons discovered puppetry as a young boy in El Dorado, Arkansas: “It just captured me! And I was a very shy child. When I was in first grade, I was doing puppet shows for show and tell—I got to perform and I got to hide, at the same time.” Since then, Parsons has trained as an actor, and shed his shyness. Now he’s visible throughout his puppet performances. The puppet master feels no need to hide beneath a hood or behind a curtain (though he does wear black clothing). “It’s like a cooking show,” Parsons observes. “You get to see me make the dish.”
The show includes three world premieres. For one, “The Mountain: Five Postcards,” Parsons gave himself a demanding task: to depict a stoic puppet climbing Mount Everest, with minimal dialogue. Will the mountaineer reach the peak of Everest? To find out, you must see the show. (Parsons refused to tell me.)
“Gemma’s Share” is a monologue by a housewife from Mahopac speaking at a 12-step meeting. Gemma falls deeper into despair as she elaborates, finally pulling a handkerchief from her pocketbook to dry her eyes. (The handkerchief attaches to her hand with magnets.)
Audiences are often quite moved by Gemma’s confessions. For some reason, it’s sometimes easier to identify with a talking sock than with a talking human. —Sparrow
Cabot Parsons performing "Calling Gladys."
Photo
Miltiadis Afentoulis
Anna Contes Maguire
Mixed Mediums
“SHOU SUGI BAN SCULPTURES” BY JAMES CASABERE AT ‘T’ SPACE
Through October 13 Tspacerhinebeck.org
‘T’ Space Reserve, a 30-acre wooded preserve located a few miles east of Rhinebeck, is easily missed, the only parking a small clearing off the side of the road. Yet, since its founding in 2010, it has become an important fixture on the Hudson Valley art scene, hosting summer exhibitions that serve as the linchpin for a crosspollination of painting and sculpture, architecture, poetry, and new music. ‘T’ Space is low-key, small scaled, and delightfully intimate.
Acclaimed architect Steven Holl founded the Steven Myron Holl Foundation in 2007 and subsequently built a T-shaped gallery on a property adjacent to the residence he shares with his wife, architect Dimitra Tsachrelia, and their child. ‘T’ space evolved as a project of a family of artists, exhibiting the paintings of Steven’s brother, James Holl, and appointing James’s wife, photographer Susan Wides, as ‘T’ Space’s director and curator. To prevent a subdivision of McMansions, Steven Holl acquired an additional 28 acres in 2014 and expanded the complex to include an experimental guesthouse, an outdoor sculpture trail, and a building housing a second gallery and the Architectural Archive and Library.
Each season, two or three artists (one of whom is connected to architecture) are selected for the summer exhibitions. They’ve included such art world luminaries as Martin Puryear, Polly Apfelbaum, Ai Weiwei, and Richard Artschwager. The unique space and
wooded site of the gallery is a powerful draw, inspiring installations that play on the relationship between painting, sculpture, and architecture.
With its white plywood walls, glass-framed views of the forest, and soaring spaces, the skylit interior of the compact, cedar-clad structure is spare and meditative. Holl designed the building so that a portion of the space is always hidden from view, transforming art viewing into a physically immersive experience. Each exhibition is accompanied by a salon-style outdoor poetry reading and musical performance. The informality and creative ferment at these gatherings are reminiscent of the 1970s-loft scene. The gatherings are now private, although each event is recorded and posted on ‘T’ Space’s website.
The organization also publishes catalogs encapsulating the exhibitions, readings, and performances; sponsors a summer lectures series; and hosts a competitive architectural summer residence. Its educational mission has been expanded to include the local community: Last year the organization launched programs with Art Effect in Poughkeepsie and Community Matters Too to bring underserved youth to the complex. Participants in Kingston’s art educational organization DRAW have also visited ‘T’ Space.
The Archive and Library are housed in a low-slung building with corrugated aluminum sides and a green roof that zigs and zags through the woods. Inside, the skylit structure displays more than 1,200 models of Holl’s buildings. It’s one of the largest such displays in the US and is complemented by of hundreds of Holl’s sketchbooks—he starts each design with a watercolor— thousands of books, and artworks by renowned architects.
Currently on display in the Archive gallery through October 13 are the blackened geometric sculptures of
James Casebere. Crafted out of sustainable bamboo plywood burned using a traditional Japanese method of wood preservation, the geometric, faceted forms suggest slouching figures, industrial machinery stuttering into life, and burgeoning cityscapes. Casebere’s August opening featured a poetry reading by Samiya Bashir and a performance by composer Pamela Z.
The creme de la creme of ‘T’ Space is the Ex of In House, an off-the-grid, 918-square-foot building structured around the intersection of spheres and tesseracts. (It’s availble for rental on Airbnb.) The slanting exterior wall, asymmetrical roof, circular cutouts of glass, and adjacent reflecting pool are playful, almost sculptural elements. Inside, soaring space alternates with cozy nooks. As with Holl’s other buildings, the use of plywood conveys a warmth and sense of utility.
‘T’ Space is an ambitious experiment that posits an alternative to the consumptive, environmentally destructive patterns of contemporary American life, offering a hopeful vision for the future: architecture as a humanistic practice that harmonizes nature and culture and fosters community, the arts as spiritual and intellectual sustenance, and collaboration as the pathway toward innovation, resting on the cornerstone of sustainability. Big ideas are percolating in this secluded enclave of Dutchess County, which Mid-Hudson Valley residents are privileged to experience first-hand.
‘T’ Space Gallery is open Sundays from 1 to 5 pm through October 13; admission is free. To schedule a guided 90-minute tour, email visit@smhfoundation.org; the cost is $50 per person and a minimum of two people is required. Scheduled tours on October 6 and 13 at 2 pm require a $25 donation. ‘T’ Space Reserve, 125-1/2 Round Lake Road, Rhinebeck.
—Lynn Woods
Shou Sugi Ban #3, James Casebere, burnt bamboo plywood, 45" x 65" x 60", 2024
A Tradition of Inspiration
THE 2024 KAATSBAAN ANNUAL FESTIVAL IN TIVOLI September 13 through October 6 Kaatsbaan.org
Perhaps the best measurement of an arts institution’s success isn’t the arts programming that it presents or the size of the audiences it attracts at all. It’s the new artists that the programming inspires; the budding young creatives who are stirred by what they encounter at such a facility—and from there go forth into the world to make more great art, share it with their own audiences, and pass that inspiration on to future generations. And since its 1990 founding, the 153-acre artist sanctuary known as Kaatsbaan Cultural Park has inspired hundreds of new artists. A delicious example of this is the prodigal return of the Limon Dance Company’s associate artistic director, Logan Frances Kruger, who will return for the 2024 Kaatsbaan Annual Festival.
“I was actually a student at a summer ballet intensive that Limon did at Kaatsbaan in 2006,” explains Kruger, who began studying the work of the company’s founder
and namesake, legendary dancer Jose Limon, at age nine, got her BFA from Juilliard, and served as the troupe’s principal dancer before assuming her current position. “I’m thrilled to be coming back for the festival in September.” The Limon Dance Company’s appearance at the festival is part of “New Works Bill” (September 28-29), a mixed program of dance performances woodshopped at Kaatsbaan that also premieres works from the Boca Tuya and Music from the Sole companies. The festival begins with a screening of Merce/ Misha/More (September 13), a documentary focusing on the friendship and mutual collaboration of dance icons Merce Cunningham and Mikhail Baryshnikov. The series wraps with “Autobiography (v100 and v101)” (October 5-6), a performance by the London-based Company Wayne McGregor that fuses genetic code, AI, and choreography. Although Kaatsbaan was initially established with a focus on dance, its programming has expanded to include other artistic disciplines, and the offerings between the above events well reflect the center’s broad creative net.
Author Francine Prose, whose books include Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932; A Changed Man; Reading Like a Writer; and the National Book Award
finalist Blue Angel, will read from and converse on her newest work, 1974: A Personal History (September 14).
In other media, curator Hilary Greene and artists from Kaatsbaan’s 2024 Visual Arts Exhibition will lead a free guided tour of the works on view at the site’s indoor and outdoor galleries (September 15), while “Listening to Records with Joe Hagan” (September 19) has the Vanity Fair correspondent spinning eclectic and rare records on a super-high-end vacuum-tube stereo system a la the vibe of a Japanese listening cafe. In the live musical realm, Gaia Music Collective will lead a community sing of Pete Seeger-related songs at the property’s Outdoor Meadow Stage (September 20) and Bard College-rooted new music ensemble Contemporaneous will unveil an excerpt from “History of Life,” a work-in-progress that draws on the original music and language of ancient Greece (September 21).
“Kaatsbaan is such a nurturing place for the arts,” says Kruger. “To me, the work that it presents is work that really captures the human experience and touches people in their hearts.”
See the website for a full schedule, performance locations, and ticket prices.
—Peter Aaron
The 2024 Kaatsbaan Annual Festival features sculptures by Emil Alzamora (on ground) and Arthur Gibbons (in tree).
short list
Hudson Valley Wine & Food Festival
September 7-8 at the Dutchess County Fairgrounds in Rhinebeck
The 23rd Annual Hudson Valley Wine & Food Festival features over 300 vendors, including wineries like Three Brothers and City Winery, local distilleries such as Tuthilltown and Cooper’s Daughter, and gourmet food options from Laura’s Raw Honey and Caribbean Hibiscus. Attendees can participate in cooking demonstrations, cocktail classes, and wine seminars conducted by chefs such as Marcus Guiliano, Ric Orlando, Vincent Tropepe, and Natacha Gomez Dupuy, with additional insights from wine expert Debbie Gioquindo and mixologist Brendan F. Casey. The festival also features live music by the Carrie Zazz Band. $28$86. Saturday,11am-6pm and Sunday,11am-5pm.
“The Garbologists”
September 13-29 at Shadowland Stages in Ellenville
Lindsay Joelle’s “The Garbologists” offers a poignant yet hilarious exploration of unlikely friendship. Set against the backdrop of a New York City garbage route, the play follows Danny, a white blue-collar sanitation worker, and Marlowe, a Black, Ivy-educated newcomer. As they navigate their shifts in a 19-ton garbage truck, their initial banter evolves into a deeper connection as they come to understand the unexpected commonalities that connect them. Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays at 8pm, Sundays at 2pm. $35.
“American Terror: An Opera”
September 14 at Hudson Hall
“American Terror” is an evolving chamber opera by Hudson-based composer Jeffrey Lependorf. This workin-progress performance is inspired by the intense 1969 debate between William F. Buckley and Noam Chomsky on US military policy in Vietnam. The opera reimagines this historic dialogue through a blend of Haydn and Scriabin’s music, offering fresh perspectives on a topic that remains highly relevant. Tickets are available on a “pay what you will” basis, with advance reservations suggested. 5pm.
The Eighth Catskill Conquest Rally
September 21
The Catskill Conquest Rally Series features 135-mile scenic tours through the Catskill Region, combining historical charm with the thrill of the road. The eighth rally begins at the Catskill Visitor Center in Mount Tremper with a 9:30am breakfast. Following a historic route from the 1903 Automobile Endurance Run, the tour includes stops at the Cauliflower Festival in Margaretville, Birdsong Farm Community Garden, the Franklin Railroad and Community Museum, and Hanford Mills Museum. The event costs $100 per car, and all vehicles are welcome.
Linda Diamond & Company
September 21 at the Kleinert/James Center in Woodstock
The Kleinert/James Arts Center presents an interactive dance performance by the award-winning Linda Diamond & Company. The recital, which will take place both on stage and within the gallery, features duets and trios from the company’s repertory. Highlights include excerpts from “Hymn to the Earth” with music by Tom Desisto, and “Salidas y Entradas” with music by Tania Leon. Principal dancer Nina Deacon will perform a solo piece, “Precipice,” with music by Christopher Theofanidis. The event also features paintings by Ford Crull. $20. 2pm.
The Artichoke
September 21 at the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon
Hosted by Drew Prochaska, the Artichoke storytelling series presents New York City raconteurs sharing candid, heartfelt, and humorous personal tales. The lineup includes Kenice Mobley, who has performed at the Netflix is A Joke Festival; Molly Austin, known for sketch segments on Rachel Dratch’s “Late Night Snack”; Esmond Fountain, featured on PBS’s “Stories from the Stage”; Rory Scholl, who has appeared on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon”; and eight-time Moth Story Slam winner Tina McKenna. $25. 8pm.
Lewis Black
September 21 at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington
Iconic comedian Lewis Black is wrapping up a 35year career with his final “Goodbye Yeller Brick Road” tour. Known for his fiery rants and sharp observations, Black has spent decades exposing life’s absurdities and societal hypocrisies, earning two Grammy Awards along the way. His latest special, “Tragically, I Need You,” reflects on pandemic struggles and the chaos in America, and has garnered over 1.6 million views on YouTube. $70-$130. 8pm.
Garrison Craft
September 21 at the Garrison Art Center
The 54th annual Garrison Craft show hosts over 60 artisans displaying high-quality handmade crafts, from furniture and photography to jewelry, glass, fiber art, fine art, ceramics, wood, and decorative pieces. Featured vendors include Designs by Jenna, Bow Glassworks, Cedar Knoll Pottery, and Line Study Textiles. Attendees can enjoy live music by local musicians, regional food vendors, and pottery demonstrations by teaching artists. Proceeds support the Garrison Art Center’s gallery exhibitions, educational programs, and community events. $5-$15. 10-5pm.
Art Walk Kingston
September 21-22 at various locations in Kingston
Launched in 2016, Art Walk Kingston has become one of the Hudson Valley’s largest open studio tours. The event showcases artists displaying paintings, photography, sculpture, and ceramics in home studios and galleries across Kingston’s Uptown, Midtown, and Rondout neighborhoods. Featured artists include Amy Fenton-Shine, Andrew Moore, and Chris Gonyea, while participating galleries include ArtPort Kingston, At Land, and the Lace Mill Gallery. Highlights include a live performance by the Levanta Music Ensemble, poetry readings by Ulster County Poet Laureate Kate Hymes, and live painting by Nancy Ostrovsky. Free. 12-5pm.
Newburgh Open Studios
September 28-29 at various locations in Newburgh Founded in 2011 by Gerardo Castro and Michael Gabor of Newburgh Art Supply, Newburgh Open Studios is an annual self-guided tour where local artists open their studios to the public. Visitors can view and purchase a diverse range of original artworks while gaining insight into the artists’ creative processes. The event includes pop-up galleries, group shows, and the Glenlily Grounds outdoor sculpture exhibit—a display of site-specific art, installation, and sculpture across 11 acres of fields, hills, and woods at 532 Grand Avenue. Free. 12-6pm.
Hudson Valley Garlic Festival
September 29-30 at Cantine Field in Saugerties
This local festival attracts over 50,000 enthusiasts each year to celebrate garlic in all its forms. Enjoy not just garlic, but also garlic-themed foods like garlic fried dough, garlic steak, garlic ice cream, garlic carnitas, and garlic lemonade. In addition to garlic vendors, the festival features food vendros, live music, dancing, and activities for kids. There’s also craft stalls selling pottery, jewelry, candles, art, woodworking, and textiles. $8-$15. Children under 12 get in free. 10am-5pm.
—Ryan Keegan
on September 21.
Photo by John Verner
Dancers Nina Deacon and Ellie Lehman. Linda Diamond Dance Company performs at the Kleinert/ James in Woodstock
Yemen Blues plays the Local in Saugerties September 27.
Sweeping Promises
September 5 at No Fun in Troy
Although the duo officially started in Boston in 2019, the roots of Sweeping Promises (singer and bassist Lira Mondal and guitarist and drummer Caufield Schnug) go back to 2008 in Lawrence, Kansas, where the two met as college students. Now based in Kansas once again, the pair plays distinctly catchy, lo-fi postpunk/new wave with echoes of outfits like Devo, Pylon, the Bush Tetras, and the Au Pairs. This late summer tour is for their 2023 album Clean Living is Coming for You, a joint release by the Sub Pop and Feel It labels. Opener TBA. (Gift present themselves September 13; Pile, Oceantor, and Bruiser and Bicycle ride October 4.) 7pm. $15.64. Troy.
Cat Power
September 7 at Ulster Performing Arts Center in Kingston
Could there be a more Hudson Valley-appropriate, hipster-hippie-bridging show than acclaimed indie chanteuse Cat Power (aka Chan Marshall) doing Bob Dylan songs? The singer-songwriter’s 13th and newest album—and third all-covers effort—is Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert, which finds her interpreting the whole of that erroneously named, landmark live album (although bootlegged for years under the “Royal Albert Hall” title before getting an official release in 1998, it was actually recorded at Manchester Free Trade Hall on Dylan’s 1966 UK tour). (Jack DeJohnette plays solo piano at the Woodstock Playhouse September 28; Suzanne Vega visits the Old Dutch Church October 4.) 8pm. $49.50-$79.50.
Gogol Bordello
September 10 at Empire Live in Albany
It’s always a party when everyone’s favorite gypsy punk band, the expatriate-Ukrainian, Lower East Side-based Gogol Bordello, bounds into the region. Led by wild front man Eugene Hütz, the group smashes together traditional Romani and Ukrainian folk music with punk rock, dub, and other influences that extend to Jimi Hendrix and Parliament-Funkadelic. Unsurprisingly Hütz has vocally condemned Putin’s invasion of his homeland, working to raise relief funds for victims of the war and recording the song “Man with the Iron Balls,” a tribute to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, with Primus’s Les Claypool. (X mark their last tour September 25; Twin Temple holds forth October 2.) 8pm. $35, $38.
Country Gongbang
September 22 at the Falcon in Marlboro
The youthful South Korean band Country Gongbang fuses contemporary bluegrass with the folk and pop styles of their native nation and here make their way to our region on their first American tour. “To be honest, we are not famous at all in Korea,” says fiddle player Jongsu Yoon, whose group has performed in Japan and France. “First of all, there is no market in Korea that can be called the bluegrass scene, but even so, our music is really liked by a few people. It feels strange that people seem to like it more abroad.” Live videos of the quintet make it clear why they’re so well loved by those who’ve seen them. (Fred Thomas of the JB’s returns September 13: Deadgrass jams the music of Jerry Garcia et al September 19.) 7:30pm. Donation requested.
Yemen Blues
September 27 at the Local in Saugerties
Founded by leader, singer, and gimbri (sintir) player Ravid Kalahani, Yemen Blues creates a heady, highly danceable sound that draws from the Yemenite culture that he grew up with, blending traditional Jewish and Arabic music and chants with occasional hip-hop, club, and rock beats into an exotic, culture-spanning mix. Kalahani’s collaborators in the band include UruguayanIsraeli percussionist Rony Irwyn, oud and bass player Shanir Blumenkranz, and percussionist Dan Mayo. (Bia Ferreria brings Brazilian sounds September 25; Habibi Festival Hudson Valley presents Tarak Yamani and Yacine Boulares October 3.) 8pm. $29.87.
Basilica SoundScape 2024
September 27-29 at Basilica Hudson
A top annual attraction is the Basilica SoundScape festival, which here returns to its home at the massive former waterfront foundry for three days of adventurous music and art. The festivities open on September 27 with a six-hour set by the renowned DJ duo Octo Octa and Eris Drew. September 28 has Lightning Bolt, Helado Negro, Still House Plants, Couch Slut, ELUCID, Maria BC, Cassandra Jenkins, Greg Mendez and Babehoven, and others plus the Writers in the Rafters reading series. September 29 is a free community day for all ages with programming TBA. (The Jupiter Nights series has Wild Pink, the Fascinating Chimera Project, and Greem Jellyfish September 5.) See website for times and ticket prices.
—Peter Aaron
#6, Giona Maiarelli, collage. From the exhibition "Come Together" at Available Items in Tivoli.
1053 GALLERY
1053 MAIN STREET, FLEISCHMANNS
“A Song to Follow.” Work by Michael McGrath and Ken Hiratsuka. Through September 22.
AL HELD FOUNDATION
26 BEECHFORD DRIVE, BOICEVILLE
“On the Grounds 2024.” Work by Natalia Arbelaez, Nicole Cherubini, Re Jin Lee, and Katy Schimert. Through October 13.
THE ALDRICH CONTEMPORARY ART MUSEUM
258 MAIN STREET RIDGEFIELD, CT
“Eminem Buddhism, Volume 3.” Work by Elizabeth Englander. Through October 20.
“Layo Bright: Dawn and Dusk.” Work by Layo Bright. Through October 20.
ATHENS CULTURAL CENTER
24 SECOND STREET, ATHENS
“Twenty/20.” Group show celebrating the 20th anniversary of the ACC. Through September 8.
AVAILABLE ITEMS
64 BROADWAY, TIVOLI
“Come Together.” Collages by Giona Maiarelli. Through September 8.
BANNERMAN ISLAND GALLERY
150 MAIN STREET, BEACON
“Photo Magic of the Hudson Valley.” Hudson Valley photography by Alec Halstead. Opening reception on Saturday, August 10 from 4-6pm. Through September 8.
BARK GALLERY
3010 COUNTY HIGHWAY 6, BOVINA
“Vinyl Drypoint Print Show.” Work by Lee Ranaldo. Through September 22.
BAU GALLERY
506 MAIN STREET BEACON
“Florescence.” September 14-October 6.
“Rainbows and Dust.” Work by Karen Allen. September 14-October 6.
BENNINGTON MUSEUM
75 MAIN STREET, BENNINGTON, VT
“Vermont Rocks!” Geologic troves of the Green Mountain state. Through November 10.
BERKSHIRE MUSEUM
39 SOUTH STREET, PITTSFIELD, MA
“Black Woman as Muse.” Work by Jerry Taliaferro. Through September 8.
BERNAY FINE ART
296 MAIN STREET, GREAT BARRINGTON, MA
“Stop Making Sense.” Work by Will Hutnick, Noah Post, Katia Santibanez, Kit Warren, and Deborah Zlotsky. Through September 15.
BILL ARNING EXHIBITIONS / HUDSON VALLEY
17 BROAD STREET, KINDERHOOK
“Other Beings.” Work by Hannah Barrett, Richard Butler, Jim Esber, and Cruz Ortiz. Through October 13.
CALICO PRESENTS AT SMALL TALK
1 TINKER STREET, WOODSTOCK
“Spirit Animals.” Work by Scott Ackerman, Steph Becker, Rich Cali, and Janel Schultz. Through September 12.
THE CAMPUS
341 NY-217, HUDSON
“Inaugural Exhibition.” Group show of 80 artists including Jenny Holzer and Rachel Harrison. Through September 30.
CARRIE HADDAD GALLERY
622 WARREN STREET, HUDSON
“Understories.” Work by Annika Tucksmith, Anne Francey, Allyson Levy, Eileen Murphy, Rinal Parikh, and Ragellah Rourke. Paintings by David Konigsberg upstairs. Through October 13.
CATSKILL ART SPACE
48 MAIN STREET, LIVINGSTON MANOR.
“James Esber, Jane Fine, Tracey Goodman, and Jim Leen.” Group show. Through October 26.
CHESTERWOOD
4 WILLIAMSVILLE ROAD, STOCKBRIDGE, MA
“Birth of a Shadow.” Work by Peter Barrett, Peter Dellert, DeWitt Godfrey, Wendy Klemperer, Michael Thomas, Natalie Tyler, and Joe Wheaton. Curated by Lauren Clark. Through October 21.
CLARK ART INSTITUTE
225 SOUTH STREET, WILLIAMSTOWN, MA
“Edgar Degas: Multimedia Artist in the Age of Impressionism.” Through October 14.
“Guillaume Lethiere.” 80 works by Guillaume Lethiere (1760–1832). Through October 15.
“Invisible Empires.” Work by Kathia St. Hilaire. Through September 22.
“Fragile Beauty: Treasures From the Corning Museum of Glass.” Selected glass objects from antiquity to the present day. July 4-October 27.
DIA BEACON
3 BEEKMAN STREET, BEACON
“Bass.” Installation by Steve McQueen comprising 60 ceiling-mounted lightboxes that journey through the complete spectrum of visible light in concert with a sonic component. Through December 31.
DISTORTION SOCIETY
155 MAIN STREET, BEACON
“Memor.” Work by Frances Segismundo. Through September 6.
ELENA ZANG GALLERY
3671 ROUTE 212, SHADY
“What If...” Work by Mary Frank. Through September 4.
FENIMORE ART MUSEUM
5798 STATE HIGHWAY 80 (LAKE ROAD), COOPERSTOWN.
“Banksy: The Haight Street Rat.” Work by the street artist. Through September 8.
“Bob Dylan Remastered: Drawings from the Road.” Drawings by the musician. Through September 15.
“Marc Hom: Reframed.” Photographs. Through September 2.
FRONT ROOM GALLERY
205 WARREN STREET, HUDSON “Zoe Wetherall.” Photographs. September 14-October 13.
GALLERY 40
40 CANNON STREET, POUGHKEEPSIE
“Angels, Outlaws, Sinners, and Saints.” Work by Sean Bowen and Lisa Winika. September 7-30.
GALLERY 495
495 MAIN STREET, CATSKILL
“Lull.” Group show curated by Willy Somma September 14-October 31.
GARNER ARTS CENTER
55 WEST RAILROAD AVENUE, GARNERVILLE
“Clare Kambhu.” Paintings.
“Track Spikes.” Sculpture by Pat Hickman. Both shows September 7-October 27.
GARRISON ART CENTER
23 GARRISON’S LANDING, GARRISON
“Looking Back: Portraits by Joseph Radoccia.” August 24-September 15.
“Natural Selection.” Work by Jackie Skrzynski. August 24-September 15.
“Image After.” Work by Susan Magnus. September 21-October 20.
GEARY CONTEMPORARY
34 MAIN STREET, MILLERTON
“Alan Prazniak. Paintings.” Through October 6.
GREEN KILL
229 GREENKILL AVENUE, KINGSTON
“Dionysus the Unmasked God.” Paintings by Gary Mayer. September 7-October 26.
GRIT WORKS | GRIT GALLERY
115 BROADWAY, NEWBURGH
“The Power of Parchment.” Group show. Through September 15.
HESSEL MUSEUM OF ART/CCS BARD BARD COLLEGE, ANNANDALE
“Carrie Mae Weems: Remember to Dream.” Revisits the range and breadth of Carrie Mae Weems’ prolific career through rarely exhibited and lesser-known works. Through December 1.
“Ho Tzu Nyen: Time and the Tiger.” First in-depth examination of Ho Tzu Nyen (b. 1976), Singapore in the United States. Through December 1.
HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WOODSTOCK
20 COMEAU DRIVE, WOODSTOCK
“Woodstock Village: The Evolution.” Photographs. Through October 13.
HUDSON AREA LIBRARY
51 NORTH 5TH STREET, HUDSON
“Near and Far.” Photographs by Dolwain and Suzanne Green. Through October 28.
HUDSON HALL
327 WARREN STREET, HUDSON
“Hans Frank: Cosmic Art.” Paintings. Through September 22.
JACK SHAINMAN: THE SCHOOL
25 BROAD STREET, KINDERHOOK
“Lie Doggo.” Work by Nina Chanel Abney. Through October 5.
JANE ST. ART CENTER
11 JANE STREET, SAUGERTIES
“Breaking Broken.” Work by Elizabeth Keithline. Through September 14.
KAATSBAAN CULTURAL PARK
120 BROADWAY, TIVOLI
“2024 Visual Arts Exhibition.” Works by Emil Alzamora, Sequoyah Aono, Arthur Gibbons, Kenichi Hiratsuka, Ashley Lyon, Ian McMahon, Mollie McKinley, and John Sanders. Through September 30.
LABSPACE
2642 NY ROUTE 23, HILLSDALE
“Christina Tenaglia and Adrian Meraz: Elevation.” Through September 29.
THE LACE MILL
165 CORNELL STREET, KINGSTON
“Byzantium in Kingston.” Works Miltiadis Afentoulis, Marianna Afentouli, and Anna Contes Maguire. September 7-29.
LEHMAN LOEB ART CENTER
124 RAYMOND AVENUE, POUGHKEEPSIE
“Ubuhle Women: Beadwork and the Art of Independence.” Through September 8.
“Photography as Data.” Group show. Through September 15.
LIVE 4 ART GALLERY
20 CHARLES COLMAN BOULEVARD, PAWLING
“Connected.” Work by Alibaba Awrang and Matin Malikzada. September 7-29.
MAD ROSE GALLERY
5916 NORTH ELM AVE, MILLERTON
“Basia Goldsmith, Josh Nathanson, and Ginny Howsman Freedman.” Group show. Through September 6.
MAGAZZINO ITALIAN ART
2700 ROUTE 9, COLD SPRING
“Marco Anelli: Building Magazzino 2014–2024.” Photos by Marco Anelli. Through October 14.
MANITOGA / THE RUSSEL WRIGHT DESIGN CENTER
584 ROUTE 9D, PHILIPSTOWN
“The Moss Room.” Outdoor sculpture by Alma Allen and Bosco Sodi.
September 13-November 18.
MARK GRUBER GALLERY
13 NEW PALTZ PLAZA, NEW PALTZ
“The Shawangunks.” Group show. Through September 7.
“A Passion for Painting.” Work by Kevin Cook and Marleen Weidenbaum.
September 14-November 2.
MASS MOCA
1040 MASS MOCA WAY, NORTH ADAMS, MA.
“Like Magic”. Simone Bailey, Raven Chacon, Grace Clark, Johanna Hedva, Gelare Khoshgozaran, Cate O’Connell-Richards, Rose Salane, Petra Szilagyi, Tourmaline, and Nate Young. Through August 31, 2025.
MOTHER-IN-LAW’S
140 CHURCH AVENUE, GERMANTOWN
“A Dyke Cabin of One’s Own.” Installation by Danielle Klebes curated by Elijah Wheat Showroom. Through September 21.
“Encyclopedia of Light.” A Duchampian take
on a showroom of light fixtures. September 6-November 24.
THE MOUNT
2 PLUNKETT STREET, LENOX, MA
“Sculpture at the Mount”. Juried group sculpture show. Through October 20.
NORMAN ROCKWELL MUSEUM
9 ROUTE 183, STOCKBRIDGE, MA
“What, Me Worry? The Art and Humor of MAD.” This landmark exhibition explores the unforgettable art and satire of MAD, the first magazine to brilliantly and outrageously poke holes in all aspects of American life. Through October 27.
OLANA STATE HISTORIC SITE
5720 ROUTE 9G, HUDSON
“Afterglow: Frederic Church and the Landscape of Memory.” At the heart of this exhibition are Frederic Church’s rarely seen memorial landscape paintings. Through October 27.
OLIVE FREE LIBRARY
4033 ROUTE 28A, WEST SHOKAN
“Monochromatic.” Group show juried by Melinda Stickney-Gibson. Through September 7.
ONE MILE GALLERY
475 ABEEL STREET, KINGSTON
“Palmer-Smith.” Work by Glenn Palmer Smith and Austin Palmer Smith, including collaborations of their work. Through September 20.
OPUS 40
356 GEORGE SICKLE ROAD, SAUGERTIES
“Photos of Woodstock ’94.” Work by Cheryl Dunn, Danny Clinch, and Albert Watson. Through September 16.
PAMELA SALISBURY GALLERY
362 1/2 WARREN STREET, HUDSON
“Understory: Snakes, Snails, and the Forest Floor.” Group show. Through October 5.
PRIVATE PUBLIC
530 COLUMBIA STREET, HUDSON
“Summer Disaster 2.” Group show. Through September 8.
“Voice of Silence.” Photographs by Susan Wides. September 28-November 3.
QUEEN OF ROGUES
2440 ROUTE 28, GLENFORD
“Artomaton: Visions of the Fair.” AI-generated artwork by Gabriel Aronson. Through September 21.
Casey, Paint, Marco Anelli,archival pigment print mounted on Dibond. From “Marco Anelli: Building Magazzino 2014–2024,” at Magzzino Italian Art in Cold Spring.
THE RE INSTITUTE
1395 BOSTON CORNERS ROAD, MILLERTON
“Family Eye.” Group show. Through September 14.
REHER CENTER FOR IMMIGRANT CULTURE AND HISTORY
101 BROADWAY, KINGSTON
“Taking Root: Immigrant Stories of the Hudson Valley.” Through December 1.
ROBIN RICE GALLERY
234 WARREN STREET, HUDSON
“Fleeting Gestures.” Work by R. J. Muna. Through September 15.
“Inner Tidal.” Work by Benjamin Heller. Through September 15.
ROXBURY ARTS CENTER
5025 VEGA MOUNTAIN ROAD, ROXBURY
“Plant Matter.” Through October 19.
SAMUEL DORSKY MUSEUM OF ART
1 HAWK DRIVE, SUNY NEW PALTZ
“In and Out of Lineage: Tracing Artistic Heritage Through SUNY New Paltz Faculty.” Group exhibition featuring artwork by 20 members of the University’s Departments of Art and Design. September 7-December 8.
SEPTEMBER 4 HUDSON STREET, KINDERHOOK
“Taylor Davis: Until the Sun Goes Dark.” Through September 15.
STORM KING ART CENTER
1 MUSEUM ROAD, NEW WINDSOR
“Arlene Shechet: Girl Group.” Six large-scale outdoor sculptures. Through November 10.
SUPER SECRET PROJECTS
484 MAIN STREET, BEACON
“Solastagia.” Work by Kohar Minassian. Through September 8.
SUSAN ELEY FINE ART
433 WARREN STREET, HUDSON
“Eighteen.” Abstract paintings by Ted Dixon inspired by The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story. Through October 13.
‘T’ SPACE
120 ROUND LAKE ROAD, RHINEBECK
“Shou Sugi Ban Sculptures.” Wooden geometric sculptures by James Casabere. Through October 13.
TANJA GRUNNERT SALON
21 PROSPECT AVENUE, HUDSON
“Dan Devine and Susan Jennings.” Sculpture. Through September 22.
THE BOATHOUSE
105 MARKET STREET, WAPPINGERS FALLS
“Works from the Cellar.” Paintings and sculptures by Michael Leo Pilon. Through September 29.
THE WASSAIC PROJECT
37 FURNACE BANK ROAD, WASSAIC
“Tall Shadows in Short Order.” Thirty artists with large, site-specific installations. Through September 14.
THOMAS COLE HISTORIC SITE
218 SPRING STREET, CATSKILL
“Alan Michelson: Prophetstown.” Site-responsive solo exhibition. Through December 1.
“Native Prospects: Indigeneity and Landscape.”
19th-century paintings by Thomas Cole featuring
Unearthing buried gods, No. 3., Michael McGrath, oil and oil pastel on canvas. From the exhibition "A Song to Follow" at 1053 Gallery in Fleischmanns.
Native figures in context with Indigenous works of historic and cultural value, and artworks by contemporary Indigenous artists. Through October 27.
TIME AND SPACE LIMITED
434 COLUMBIA STREET, HUDSON
“Daily News.” Collages by Olan Quattro. September 7-October 6.
“Phases.” Paintings by Arlene Santana Thornton. September 7-October 6.
“A Stain on Our Cities.” Mixed media fiber art by Karen Schupack. September 7-October 6.
TOMPKINS CORNERS CULTURAL CENTER
729 PEEKSKILL HOLLOW ROAD, PUTNAM VALLEY
“Painting the Valley: The Lambo Legacy.” Take a look back at the “good old days” of Putnam Valley through this family exhibit by Don and Betty Lambo and their son James. Through October 15th.
TREMAINE ART GALLERY AT THE HOTCHKISS SCHOOL
11 INTERLAKEN ROAD, LAKEVILLE, CT
“Threaded Together.” Group alumnae show. September 4-October 27.
TURLEY GALLERY
98 GREEN STREET, SUITE 2, HUDSON.
“Edward Merritt: The Long Season.” Paintings. Through September 1.
WEIRD SPECIALTY STUDIO
77 BROADWAY, TIVOLI
“Upon Further Reflection.” Work by Laura Naples and John Born. Through September 20.
WEST STRAND ART GALLERY
29 W STRAND ST, KINGSTON
“Moments.” Digital photographs by Daniel Venture. Through September 29.
WIRED GALLERY
11 MOHONK ROAD, HIGH FALLS
“Let’s Put This Paper to Bed.” Work by Sui Jenneris. Through September 22.
“Memoirs Alive.” Work by Judith Hoyt. September 28-October 27.
WOMENSWORK.ART
12 VASSAR STREET, 3RD FLOOR, POUGHKEEPSIE
“Vehement Visions: Female Rage and Empowerment.” Group show. September 6-22.
WOODSTOCK ARTISTS ASSOCIATION AND MUSEUM (WAAM)
28 TINKER STREET, WOODSTOCK
“Purely Aesthetic: Non-functional Ceramics from the Permanent Collection.” Group show. Through October 6.
“Spirit of Woodstock.” Group show. Through October 6.
“Sydney Cash: Being Seeing.” FLUTEX Sculptures. Through October 6.
WOODSTOCK BYRDCLIFFE GUILD
36 TINKER STREET, WOODSTOCK.
“Luminous Intuitions: Four Decades of Painting.” Paintings by Ford Crull. Through September 29.
The Comeau - Shakespeare Lawn Free Admission! A $10 per adult donation requested Go to woodstocklandconservancy.org for more information October 5 - 12 - 4 p.m.
Discover Garrison Craft! Shop curated goods from 60+ artisans, enjoy live music, local food, pottery demos, and more—a perfect weekend for everyone!
Use the QR code to purchase tickets and view a full list of exhibitors and schedule of events.
Proceeds support Garrison Art Center, a registered nonprofit organization that fosters the arts in the Hudson Valley. garrisonartcenter.org 845-424-3960
DOWN
1. Billy Joel’s nickname
2. What is Ozzy Osbourne's real first name?
3. Which Beatle's son inspired the song 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’?
4. What Elton John song is the best-selling rock single in history?
6. Which country is AC/DC from?
9. Who never gave an encore at his concerts?
10. What is the name of the bass guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers?
ACROSS
5. Where were Led Zeppelin getting a 'stairway to' in their 1971 hit song?
7. What band was known as the “Fab Five” in the 1980s?
8. Which classic rock album is sometimes said to be a soundtrack to The Wizard of Oz?
11. Who replaced former band member Pete Best in The Beatles?
12. What English rock band produced three legendary guitarists: Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, and Eric Clapton?
Email your completed puzzle to Live@RadioWoodstock.com to be entered into our grand prize drawing!
Horoscopes
By Cory Nakasue
The Deep End
In September, we come to the precipice of a steep drop in the swimming pool. Despite all of the surprises and noise of summer, we’ve been able to feel the ground beneath our feet (even if it was quaking). As we continue to take steps forward, with our toenails grazing the bottom, the floor disappears, and we’re forced to swim. We’re in the deep end. Even though Mercury finally comes home to practical Virgo on September 9th, and the Sun moves into equitable Libra on the 22nd (the fall equinox), it’s no match for the churning emotionality of September’s water-sign placements.
First, Mars enters Cancer on the 4th for a prolonged period due to an upcoming retrograde. Our emotional sensitivities will be activated around topics of safety, tribal identity, and comforts of the past. On the 17th, eclipse season begins with a lunar eclipse in Pisces. Its proximity to Neptune in Pisces suggests tidal waves of empathy but also deep yearnings for escape and all forms of anesthetics. Finally, Venus enters Scorpio on September 22. We may develop a taste for the extreme or forbidden when it comes to relationships, beauty, and pleasure. With all three water signs in play, objectivity is not our strong suit and half-measures will feel unsatisfying.
This is all intensified by Pluto’s final return to Capricorn. It only visits for a couple of months before heading back to Aquarius, but it marks the end of a process that was started in 2008. Pluto, symbol of subterranean power and the corrosive force that is necessary for regeneration, also finalizes America’s Pluto return. A planetary return occurs when a planet comes back to the place it occupied at an entity’s inception. This marks the end of a 248year cycle for the nation.
Learn more about this month’s lunar eclipse on Chronogram.com.
ARIES (March 20–April 19)
The changes that you’re going through this month happen underground, behind the scenes, and in the deep recesses of your psyche. Dealing with complex emotional material is not traditionally Aries’s forte, and you might be tempted to force actions and decisions. I recommend you stay quiet and listen, like a snake coiled up under a rock waiting for just the right moment to strike. You need an unusual amount of rest and tending to during this time. Luckily, there is some practical first aid available to help regulate a nervous system that’s feeling all the feelings. Lick your wounds in a safe space.
TAURUS (April 19–May 20)
Your message really lands this month, but it’s not due to the brilliance of your ideas or the soberness of your delivery. Your ability to stir emotion is your main strength, and you have receptive audiences. Whether you’re trying to convince a partner to do something new or trying to mobilize a larger group of people to consider a massive overhaul, your words are strong conveyors of emotion. You are on the receiving end of this too, due to a greater need to experience intensity. You’re learning to align what you say with how you feel for more powerful communication.
Cory Nakasue is an astrology counselor, writer, and teacher. Her talk show, “The Cosmic Dispatch,” is broadcast on Radio Kingston (1490AM/107.9FM) Sundays from 4-5pm and available on streaming platforms. AstrologybyCory.com
GEMINI (May 20–June 21)
Even you can get overstimulated. You might be looking for recovery and a sense of order after what looks like an exhausting August. You may have had a lot of fun with all of the movement and excitement. This is Gemini’s happy place but also its coping mechanism. When life gets that loud and active, it’s hard to feel the subtleties and disturbances of emotion. You might finally be tired enough to welcome some stillness and deep processing into your life. You’ll definitely be able to clean up after yourself if summer’s bombast created a mess. It’s time for emotional hygiene.
CANCER
(June 21–July 22)
You are very much in your element this month. The water is warm and you’re a good swimmer. The feelings are coming in strong and fast, and you know just how to channel them. There is so much emotional fuel at your disposal for pursuing anything or anyone that you desire. Speculative activities are irresistible, and if you’re not careful, you might get sucked into a bottomless pit of intrigue. But I don’t think you’re in the mood to be careful. As Oscar Wilde says, “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.”
LEO
(July 22–August 23)
Hold on to your wallet and your secrets this month. Your ability to discern trustworthy people from those who might take advantage of you is compromised. Your strong desire to merge intimately with lovers, friends, or business partners might cloud your judgment. Your talent for imagining best-case scenarios and being generous with your trust are wonderful qualities, but save something back for yourself. You’re inclined to surrender to your own intense emotions right now. You’re tired of being rational! If you’ve been needlessly cautious for too long, go all-in. Otherwise, try to walk the line between paranoia and recklessness.
VIRGO (August 23–September 23)
Some new challenges and realizations regarding where you have been too critical, or not critical enough, will come to the fore. This could create a turning point in partnerships through forgiveness, compassion, and the ability to heal old disputes. However, there is also the potential to become incredibly ungrounded, needlessly sacrificial, and hoodwinked by your own fantasies and fears. It will be very easy to project your own emotions onto other people at this time, but that’s not necessarily a recipe for disaster. If you’re aware that you’re emotionally projecting, you could learn a whole lot about yourself right now.
LIBRA (September 23–October 23)
Our thoughts and feelings are processed by our living tissues. So are the energies, vapors, and vibrations we absorb from others. This month you are especially absorbent. Create the best possible environments to be in and the most nourishing diets for your mind and heart. It’s back-to-school time for you in terms of your mental, emotional, and physical health. Get rid of toxic social obligations, replace the water filter, and toss out overprocessed food and media content. Feel difficult feelings, and pay attention to the way you distract yourself from them. Feel them all the way through without creating a story about them.
PARTY Sept. 12
SCORPIO (October 23–November 22)
You actually love the deep end of the pool and don’t understand the people who wade in the shallow end for what seems like an eternity. You’re ready to jump in! When Venus enters your sign on the fall equinox, you are at your mysterious, magnetic, penetrating best. The qualities that you possess which usually overwhelm or frighten others, become quite alluring, and this bolsters your self-esteem immensely. This is especially useful because you’re also starting a new chapter with regard to your self-expression, creative projects, and risk-taking. Use the inspiration you get from the children in your life.
SAGITTARIUS (November 22–December 22)
If you were a house, your basement would be filling up with water this month. Your fiery temperament tends to mask a lot of nebulous emotion and uncomfortable memories that you don’t know what to do with. It’s so much easier to exist in the energetic and intellectual plane. It’s so much easier to be forward-thinking, chasing dreams and crusading for your ideals and your people. The emotional tides that are rising, threaten to dampen some of your fire. It’s important to familiarize yourself with feelings of uncertainty and vulnerability so that you remember that you inhabit a body.
CAPRICORN (December 22–January 20)
September might feel uncomfortably hot and bothered, especially for a sign as cool as Capricorn. Not only are you more likely to go to emotional extremes with those close to you, you’re catching some very strong feelings about your friends and acquaintances. You’re more “other”-focused than usual, and that may crack the door open for feelings of jealousy and irritation. Any outsized reactions you have to others, reveal more about you than your perceived opponents. Your mind is also more sensitive to and inclusive of emotion, fear, and imagination. Let your walls crumble. Someone’s trying to make contact.
AQUARIUS
(January 20–February 19)
Money has no intrinsic value. But, we all can agree that it buys us the things we do value, like food and shelter. At this point in time, you’re trying to put both the concept of money and the reality of money in their proper places. Your feelings about it keep shapeshifting. You’d do well to remember that no amount of hating or loving money will solve the conundrum of how and what to value. A new era of learning to neutralize the subject of money and assigning value to more eternal qualities is dawning.
PISCES
(February 20–March 19)
On the one hand, you’re feeling the pressure to get serious and pick a form. On the other hand, the temptation to dissolve boundaries so that you can embody everything is calling. You were born to swirl and devote yourself to finding the loopholes in rigid doctrines. You are the zodiac’s escape artist! The important people in your life might feel nervous about your ephemerality. When they insist that you adhere to certain containers, teach them about the paradox of finding shapes in movement. In reality, all lines blur because nothing is static. An unwavering form is the sign of something manufactured.
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parting shot
A Sculpture’s Quest for Freedom
For over 30 years, New Paltz-based sculptor Trina Greene has been casting figures in bronze. She typically begins with a sketch and then builds her life-sized figures from clay slabs which she refines into works rich with detail and a living presence.
Her recent work, First Step to Freedom, commissioned by the Ulster County Legislature, is a bronze statue of Isabella Baumfree Vanwagenen (later Sojourner Truth) in 1826 as she was walking to freedom carrying her daughter, Sophia. This was the year in which she escaped enslavement and set off on a heroic journey to advocate for women’s rights and the abolition of slavery. Greene’s sculpture will be on display in an exhibition opening September 28 at City Hall in Kingston.
Not unlike Sojourner Truth’s quest for freedom, Greene’s sculpture has been on a journey towards liberation. Greene began her work in 2020. She presented two drawings to the president of SUNY New Paltz for a ceremony that was canceled just days before the unveiling when the Black and Women’s Studies
Departments of SUNY announced that they would not attend as they had not been involved. The statue was subsequently stored in Kingston for three years.
Kitt Potter, director of the Department of Arts and Cultural Affairs in Kingston, began working on releasing the statue in the fall of 2022. Potter helped bring Greene’s sculpture of Isabella to Kingston City Hall.
“I am honored to welcome this great work to City Hall and tell the stories of the young, brave mother Isabella through Trina Greene’s vision,” says Potter. “What I love most about Trina is that she tells the bitter truth of slavery in Ulster County through the arts with no attempt to sugarcoat the horrible reality. This work serves as a tribute to all mothers worldwide who would risk their lives to protect their children.”
Having just celebrated her 88th birthday, Greene reflects on her work. “People can see this beautiful bronze depiction of an enslaved Black woman, now known to the world as a symbol of courage against all odds, and the dark side of Hudson Valley history.”
“Eventually, it is hoped, she will claim the spot that
has been prepared for her: in front of the Sojourner Truth Library on the SUNY New Paltz campus. She is a familiar figure, as she will already have gained wide-spread recognition through her travels in the MidHudson Valley,” Greene says.
“There’s a lot to unpeel about Sophia, and we are hoping this new Trina Greene beauty will inspire historians to dig deeper into the archives to find the story,” Potter adds.
An unveiling ceremony is planned for September 28 at City Hall in Kingston from 5pm-8pm. From 6pm8pm, in the council chambers, celebrated actress Aixa Kendrick will portray an elder Sojourner looking back at her former life as Isabella. Other presenters and performers include the Center for Creative Education dancers and drummers, Anne Gordon, Ulster County Poet Laureate Kate Hymes, Maxwell Kofi Donker, SUNY Black Studies professor Anthony Dandridge, Rev. Evelyn Clarke, and the Women’s Drumsong Orchestra.
—Mike Cobb
Sculptor Trina Greene working on her sculpture of Sojourner Truth, First Step to Freedom The finished work is pictured left.
