Parrish Art Museum facts for kids
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| Established | 1898 |
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| Location | 279 Montauk Highway Water Mill, NY |
| Visitors | 30,000/yearly (old Jobs Lane location) |
The Parrish Art Museum is a cool art museum in Water Mill, New York. It was designed by famous architects Herzog & de Meuron. The museum moved to its current home in 2012 from a nearby village called Southampton.
This museum is special because it mostly shows art by artists who lived and worked on Long Island's East End. This area has been a popular spot for artists for a long time, almost like an "artist colony."
The Parrish Art Museum started way back in 1898. Today, it has a huge collection of over 3,500 artworks! These pieces range from the 1800s to today. You can see art by famous modern artists like Chuck Close, Eric Fischl, and Donald Sultan. It also has works by art legends such as Jackson Pollock, Roy Lichtenstein, and Willem de Kooning.
The museum is also home to some of the most important collections of art by two American masters: William Merritt Chase, who was an American Impressionist, and Fairfield Porter, a realist painter from after World War II.
Contents
History of the Museum
Early Days in Southampton (1898–2012)
The Parrish Art Museum was started in 1898 by Samuel Longstreth Parrish. He was a successful lawyer and a Quaker who loved collecting art. He began buying art in the 1880s and wanted a place to keep his collection. This collection included Italian Renaissance paintings and copies of old Greek and Roman sculptures.
The first museum building was designed by architect Grosvenor Atterbury. It was built in 1897 in downtown Southampton. The museum was officially named the Art Museum of Southampton the next year. One reason for starting the museum here was that it was an artist colony. A famous artist named William Merritt Chase had even started an art school nearby.
The original building got bigger twice, once in 1902 and again in 1913. After Samuel Parrish passed away in 1932, he left the museum and its art to the Village of Southampton. But without his leadership, the museum struggled for a while.
Things changed in the 1950s when Rebecca Bolling Littlejohn became the new president of the museum's board. She realized how important American art was. Mrs. Littlejohn worked hard to add more American art to the museum's collection. She especially looked for art by artists connected to eastern Long Island, like Thomas Moran and Childe Hassam. When she passed away, she left over 300 paintings, drawings, and watercolors from her own collection to the museum. This included a wonderful collection of 31 paintings by American Impressionist William Merritt Chase.
In 1981, the museum's collection grew even more. Nearly 200 artworks by Fairfield Porter were given to the museum by his wife and family. Porter was a well-known American painter and writer who lived in Southampton for many years.
Because of these important donations, the museum now shows how American art has changed over time. It goes from early landscape paintings to modern art styles like the New York School. The museum focuses on American painting from the 1900s and 2000s. It pays special attention to artists who have lived and worked on Long Island's East End. This area was once home to famous artists like Jackson Pollock and Roy Lichtenstein. Today, artists like Chuck Close and Eric Fischl live there.
For a long time, much of the museum's art was kept in storage because the buildings were too small. In 2000, the museum bought the nearby Rogers Memorial Library building to use as an extra space. However, even with this addition, the buildings were still not big enough for the growing collection.
In 2012, when the museum moved to Water Mill, the old library building was sold. The original Parrish building in Southampton is now being updated to become a new community center.
New Home in Water Mill (2012–Present)
The museum decided it needed a new, modern building with proper climate control to protect the artworks. So, in 2005, the museum bought a large piece of land in Water Mill, New York. This land was once a tree nursery and was right next to a winery. It was about 2.3 miles from the old location.
After looking at many architects, the museum chose Herzog & de Meuron to design the new building. These architects had won the Pritzker Prize, which is a very important award in architecture. The first plan for the new museum was a huge project, costing about $80 million. It was going to be a "village" of 30 small buildings, looking like artists' studios.
In 2008, Terrie Sultan became the new Director. Because of money problems during the Financial crisis of 2007–2008, the museum had to make big changes to its plans. The new building budget was cut a lot, to about $26.2 million.
The final design for the new museum looks like a giant barn. It is 615 feet long and 95 feet wide, with concrete walls. The building has a large porch and spaces for education and other activities. Inside, the museum is very simple, all on one floor. The public areas, like the reception and cafe, are on one side. The offices and art handling areas are on the other. The art galleries are in two long rows, on either side of a central hallway.
There are seven galleries for the permanent collection and three for special temporary shows. All the galleries use natural daylight, which changes throughout the day and with the seasons. The building is placed to catch the special "Hamptons light." This light is said to be one reason why so many artists have loved working in the area. The new Parrish Art Museum officially opened its doors on November 10, 2012.
Amazing Art Collections
William Merritt Chase Collection
The Parrish Art Museum has the largest public collection of art by William Merritt Chase. It has over 40 paintings and drawings by him. The museum also has many old photos and documents about his life, especially his summers on the East End of Long Island.
Chase was a fantastic portrait and landscape painter, and also a great art teacher. When people in Southampton wanted to start an art school for the summer, they chose him to be the first teacher.
The museum's collection shows art from all parts of Chase's career. You can see early works like Still Life with Fruit (1871). There are also paintings from his famous New York park series, like Park in Brooklyn (around 1887). You can also see major studio paintings from the 1880s, such as The Blue Kimono (around 1888). And, of course, there are paintings he made during his summers in the Shinnecock Hills, like The Bayberry Bush (around 1895).
Fairfield Porter Collection
Fairfield Porter was a very important American realist painter from 1949 until he passed away in 1975. During these years, Porter lived in Southampton, New York. In 1979, his family gave about 250 of his artworks to the Parrish collection. This showed the strong connection between the artist and the museum.
Porter was not only a talented painter but also a great writer. He wrote clear and insightful art reviews for a magazine called Art News. He always said that he painted exactly what he saw, not what he thought should be there. Porter painted things he knew well: his family, his friends, and the places he lived and visited. This included Southampton and a family island off the coast of Maine.
Porter admired many Abstract Expressionist artists on the East End, like Willem de Kooning. He once wrote that "the extraordinary is everywhere" in ordinary things. He believed that realist art is great because of its structure, and the best abstract art feels incredibly real.
Other Important Collections
While the Chase and Porter collections are very important, the museum's permanent collection has many other amazing artworks. In 1958, Alfred Corning Clark gave the Parrish over two dozen paintings and watercolors. These included works by artists like Ralph Albert Blakelock and William Glackens. A year later, he gave more works by artists such as William Sidney Mount and Winslow Homer. In 1961, Mrs. Littlejohn also left many works to the museum, including pieces by John Frederick Kensett and George Luks.
Since the Porter gift in 1975, the Parrish has focused more on American painting from the 1900s and 2000s. It especially highlights artists who have had studios on the East End of Long Island since the 1950s. Some of these artists include Jane Freilicher, Larry Rivers, Chuck Close, and April Gornik. The museum also continues to add to its collection of earlier 20th-century art.
The collection also has many prints and drawings. These include works by George Bellows, Helen Frankenthaler, and Robert Rauschenberg. In 1982, Paul F. Walter donated drawings by many Minimalist artists like Dorothea Rockburne and Mel Bochner. Robert Dunnigan gave the museum over 500 etchings in 1976. The museum also has nearly 200 Japanese woodblock prints from the 1800s and 1900s.
In 2023, the Parrish Art Museum bought an art installation called 'Chisme' by a Salvadoran artist named Studio Lenca. This artwork was made with the help of a workers' union in South Florida.
Special Exhibitions
The museum usually holds four or five special exhibitions each year. Some of these shows feature art from the museum's own collection, like Fairfield Porter: Raw—The Creative Process of an American Master. But most exhibitions are put together by the Parrish curators to explore different art themes and ideas.
Recent solo shows have featured artists like Alice Aycock, Jennifer Bartlett, Alex Katz, and Roy Lichtenstein. There have also been group exhibitions like Encouraging American Genius and Sand: Memory, Meaning, and Metaphor.
The Parrish also has a long history of "juried exhibitions." In these shows, artists submit their work, and a panel of judges chooses which pieces to display. In 2008, the museum changed this to "Artists Choose Artists." For this show, artists from eastern Long Island submit their work. Then, nine well-known artists from the area visit their studios and choose two artists to include in the show, along with some of their own work. This helps artists at different stages of their careers connect with each other. "Artists Choose Artists of the East End" is still a regular program at the museum.
After the Parrish moved to Water Mill in 2012, it gained a lot more space for temporary exhibitions and for showing its permanent collection. Recent shows have featured artists like Steven and William Ladd, Alan Shields, Jules Feiffer, and Chuck Close. Future shows will include artists like Jane Freilicher and Eric Fischl.
In 2012, the museum's director, Terrie Sultan, said that for the opening of the new building, the Parrish would show art from all periods of its collection. Many of these artworks had never been seen by visitors before. During the time the new building was being planned, the museum bought many more paintings and sculptures. These included a large sculpture by Louise Nevelson and a piece by Dorothea Rockburne.
Directors
- 2008–2020: Terrie Sultan
- 2021: Kelly Taxter
- 2022: Melanie Crader (ad interim)
- 2022–present: Mónica Ramírez-Montagut
