Walking Off the Big Apple

In 1956, California artist Wayne Thiebaud took a leave of absence from teaching at Sacramento Junior College and moved to New York for the academic year. A skilled illustrator and cartoonist, the artist had developed a keen interest in art history and wanted to become a painter. Banner for Wayne Thiebaud, Draftsman at The Morgan Library & Museum An exhibition at The Morgan Library & Museum, Wayne Thiebaud, Draftsman , highlights the artist’s sketches, pastels, watercolors, and charcoal drawings. Arriving in New York during the heyday of the Abstract Impressionists, Thiebaud sought out and befriended many of the leading artists and critics of the day, including Franz Kline, Elaine and Willem de Kooning, Barnett Newman, the critic Harold Rosenberg, Robert Rauschenberg, and Jasper Johns.

Summer means festival season for music-lovers, and thoughts turn to listening to stirring music in a place with clean air, surrounded by picnic baskets and leafy lawns. New Yorkers have plenty of opportunities to enjoy music in the city and to many different types of music. Classical music fans like the relaxed atmosphere of the Naumburg Bandshell in Central Park or Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival, a festival mostly held indoors. Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts on the Bard College campus in Annandale-on-Hudson, NY Sometimes, the heat of the city in summer makes us long for places like Tanglewood in the Berkshires or the Santa Fe Opera in New Mexico. In New York State, the most celebrated festivals include the Glimmerglass Festival in Cooperstown, Caramoor in Ketonah, and Bard College’s Summerscape and Music Festival in Annandale-on-Hudson. Let’s talk about Bard. Trees on the Bard College campus near the Fisher Center offer shade for a pre-performan