The artistic and historic treasures of the Hudson Valley receive special attention from renowned appraiser and television personality, Leigh Keno, at Senate House State Historic Site on Saturday, October 23, in an arts forum, Appraising Art, Re-appraising Vanderlyn, 10 am to 4:30 pm. Also, regional experts on Hudson Valley art and culture examine the artistic Vanderlyn family, including John Vanderlyn, painter of six U.S. Presidents and an important American artist born in Kingston, NY. Tickets are $10. An evening reception with Leigh Keno in the Vanderlyn Gallery of the Senate House Museum, with wine, food and music, is $50. per person. For more information and to reserve tickets, please call (845) 338-2786.
Television personality and keynote speaker Leigh Keno shares his antiques discoveries, including the auction of early Kingston native Anna Brodhead Oliver’s portrait for $1.1 million.The forum introduces the Vanderlyn Catalogue Raisonne Project to document John Vanderlyn (1775-1852), first American painter to receive a gold medal from Napoleon Bonaparte for his art. If you have Vanderlyn family art or letters to submit for evaluation, call (845)338-2786.
Presentations include talks on Pieter Vanderlyn and John Vanderlyn contemporaries. Paintings and antiques from audience members will be evaluated by Leigh Keno and art experts during the afternoon session. Post-forum, join Leigh Keno for a soiree with chamber music, period French wine and hors d’oeuvres in the Senate House Museum. Tickets for the evening event are $50 per person. Senate House State Historic Site houses the world’s largest collection of Vanderlyn paintings, documents and ephemera.
“’Appraising Art, Re-Appraising Vanderlyn’ will be a fun-filled day for the home antiquer and the art connoisseur with a few surprises thrown in” stated Katherine Woltz, Vanderlyn Project director, who expressed her thanks to the Saugerties Historical Society and Historic Huguenot Street for their assistance in organizing the forum with the Friends of Senate House and the staff of Senate House State Historic Site.
Senate House State Historic Site is located at 296 Fair Street, Kingston, NY 12401, and is part of a system of parks, recreation areas and historic sites operated by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, and the site is one of 28 facilities administered by the Palisades Interstate Park Commission in New York and New Jersey. For further information about this and other upcoming events please call the site at (845) 338-2786 or visit the State Parks website at www.nysparks.com.
Illustration: Miniature portrait of John Vanderlyn (1775-1852). From the collection of the Senate House State Historic Site.