OPENING PARTY FOR SEEING THE CITY: SLOANS NEW YORK AT REYNOL

Press Room

Opening Party for "Seeing the City: Sloan's New York" at Reynolda House Museum of American Art

Thursday, September 4, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Sharyn Turner
336.758.5580
sturner@reynoldahouse.org

Or Sarah Mansell
336.758.5524
manselss@reynoldahouse.org

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (September 3, 2008) —October at Reynolda House Museum of American Art promises to offer a season of exciting events related to the Museum's new exhibition. "Seeing the City: Sloan's New York" will be unveiled at an opening party on Friday, October 3 from 7 to 9 p.m. The public is invited to view the works of John Sloan, who created early 20 th century images of New York from the city-dweller's point of view in paintings, drawings, prints and photographs.

At 7 p.m., exhibition curators Joyce K. Schiller and Heather Campbell Coyle will give an introduction to the artist and his work. A reception will follow, featuring complimentary hors d'oeuvres and a cash bar while guests enjoy favorite jazz standards of the 1920s and 1930s, performed by the Seth Trachy Quartet. In addition to saxophonist Trachy, a graduate of University of North Carolina School of the Arts, the group also features Russell Lacy on drums, David Caldwell Mason on piano, and Daniel Loomis on bass.

Admission to the party is $5, free to members and students. "Seeing the City: Sloan's New York" will be on view through January 4, 2009. Reynolda House is the final venue of a four-city tour and the only venue in the South.

The traveling exhibition was organized by the Delaware Art Museum. It received generous support from the Henry R. Luce Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Helen Farr Sloan Trust. Reynolda House Museum of American Art received major support for this exhibition from the Charles Babcock Arts and Community Initiative Endowment.

The exhibition opening party is the first in a series of engaging events related to both Sloan's images of New York City in the early 20th century and our own vision of Winston-Salem in the 21st century. Programs will include a series of free public forums titled "Seeing Our City: The Art of Defining a Place." The three Thursday evening forums will each include a keynote address by a nationally recognized expert on city planning and a panel discussion with state and local civic leaders. The audience will be encouraged to ask questions and contribute to the discussion.

Gallery talks on Tuesday evenings at 5:30 p.m. will explore particular aspects of the exhibition, the artist, and other ways in which life in New York City was expressed, whether in theater, literature, or politics.

A free Community Day on Sunday, October 19 from 2 to 4 p.m. will transform the Reynolda grounds into the parks and playgrounds of New York City in the early 20th century. There will be live entertainment, art activities for children, artists on the lawn, and free access to the exhibition and the historic house.

The public is encouraged to visit reynoldahouse.org. for details of these and other programs.

About Reynolda House
Reynolda House Museum of American Art is one of the nation's premier American art museums, with masterpieces by Mary Cassatt, Frederic Church, Jacob Lawrence, Georgia O'Keeffe and Gilbert Stuart among its permanent collection. Affiliated with Wake Forest University, Reynolda House features traveling and original exhibitions, concerts, lectures, classes, film screenings, and other events. The museum is located in Winston-Salem, North Carolina in the historic 1917 estate of Katharine Smith Reynolds and her husband, Richard Joshua Reynolds, founder of the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. Reynolda House and adjacent Reynolda Gardens and Reynolda Village feature a spectacular public garden, dining, shopping and walking trails. For more information, please visit reynoldahouse.org or call 336.758.5150.

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