Connecticut Art Trail (17 + 5 Viewpoints)

Who Arted?
Connecticut Art Trail

*Text from Art Trail site

Go to the Viewpoints Trail

The Connecticut Art Trail is a nationally recognized partnership between sixteen world-class museums and historic sites, created to promote Connecticut’s rich cultural assets as part of a travel experience.

The Trail was launched in 1995 as the Connecticut Impressionist Art Trail, celebrating Connecticut’s ten museums and historic sites which highlighted American Impressionism. Connecticut’s flowing rivers, unspoiled shoreline, bucolic countryside and rural Connecticut villages became a magnet for American Impressionist painters at the turn of the twentieth century. Artists flocked to the state to paint en plein air, forming colonies at the Holley House in Cos Cob/Greenwich (now the Bush-Holley Historic Site) and Miss Florence Griswold’s boarding house in Old Lyme (now the Florence Griswold Museum), which were the cornerstones for the Connecticut Impressionist Art Trail. Such familiar names as J. Alden Weir, William Chadwick, Childe Hassam, Theodore Robinson, John Twachtman and Elmer Livingston MacRae all were part of the Impressionism movement.

The Art Trail people also added 5 spots they call Viewpoints around the state. These are places that have inspired impressionist artists throughout the years and they supposedly have plaques explaining the paintings that have been done there. We’ll see. Check it out here.

I cringe at writing up art museums, but write them up I shall.

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The Artsy 17:

Visited:

Slater Memorial Art Museum, Norwich
Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven
The William Benton Museum of Art, Storrs
Center for Contemporary Printmaking, Norwalk
Mattatuck Museum Arts and History Center, Waterbury
Bruce Museum, Greenwich
Art Gallery at the University of St. Joseph, West Hartford
Housatonic Museum of Art, Bridgeport
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield

To be visited:

Bellarmine Museum of Art, Fairfield
Bush-Holley Historic Site, Cos Cob/Greenwich
Florence Griswold Museum, Old Lyme
Hill-Stead Museum, Farmington
New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain
Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford
Weir Farm National Historic Site, Wilton/Ridgefield

Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London – Mysteriously disappeared from Art Trail site in 2013

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The Five Viewpoints: (Go Here for full reports)

1. Gillette Castle State Park Overlook, East Haddam
2. Farmington River Walk, Burlington
3. Kent Falls State Park, Kent Falls, Kent
4. Sherwood Island State Park near the Pavilion, Westport
5. Windham Mills State Heritage Park, Willimantic

One response to “Connecticut Art Trail (17 + 5 Viewpoints)”

  1. Sandy Betner says:

    The Art Pass was just launched, which allows admission to all 15 museums on the Connecticut Art Trail for only $25 … a $75 value! It’s a museum lover’s stimulus package! Children twelve and under are free when accompanied by an adult. The Art Pass is only available for purchase at http://www.arttrail.org. For more informaton or to purchase, visit the website.

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