Thank you!
Your support is sustaining the future of local news in our communities.

Holiday lights light holiday hearts

Holiday lights light holiday hearts
Free hot chocolate at Fountain Square provided by Freshtown was a popular Celebration of Lights feature in advance of the traditional holiday parade organized by the Amenia Fire Department on Friday, Dec. 15. 
Photo by leila Hawken

AMENIA —  Although the event was postponed twice in recent weeks due to rain, the third time was a charm for Amenia’s annual Celebration of Lights, enjoying perfect weather Friday, Dec. 15, and attracting lots of residents to the town center to see the lighting of the town tree and the awarding of the 2023 Citizen of the Year certificate.

Activities included free hot chocolate provided by Freshtown and warm pizza donated and served by Four Brothers Pizza, where there was a big-screen showing of a fireplace image of a warming fire, and later a double feature of children’s holiday programming.

The honor of 2023 Citizen of the Year was awarded to the late Cindy Dale Snow-Pitts of Wassaic, who died last summer. The posthumous award was given by Town Supervisor Victoria Perotti to Maryanne Pitts, surviving spouse of Snow-Pitts.

Perotti praised Snow-Pitts for her dedicated volunteer service to the town and to local organizations that assist residents when needs arise.

In a brief statement, Pitts said that she was accepting the award on behalf of her wife, as a great honor and with deep love.

“We hope to begin to fill the need that Cindy helped to fill throughout the valley,” Pitts said, indicating the far-reaching extent of Snow-Pitts’ work. Her Bonnie Boxes program, offering gift boxes and hope for those battling cancer, earned her a 2015 award from the Dutchess County Executive Arts Council.

More recently, Snow-Pitts was engaged with collecting and distributing school supplies and toys for children in the Northern Harlem Valley.

Founder of Harlem Valley Arts, foundational to Snow-Pitts’ work in service to her wide community was to identify and fill a variety of needs.

Following the ceremony, the town Christmas tree was lit, soon followed by the annual Parade of Lights put on by the Amenia Fire Company, a procession of decorated fire trucks and all manner of decked-out vehicles.

Although this is a busy time of year for them, Santa and Mrs. Claus were able to appear in the parade, waving to their exuberant fans before returning to the North Pole to complete holiday preparations.

Leila Hawken

Latest News

The Millerton News - November 12, 2026

The Millerton News - November 12, 2026

Download directly

Original art, attainable prices

Original art, attainable prices

Kenise Barnes Fine Art presents “Cool & Collected ’26,” its annual exhibition celebrating the joy of collecting, featuring works priced under $2,000.

D.H. Callahan

There’s a corner of YouTube populated by real-time footage of high-dollar art sales from prestigious New York and London auction houses like Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips. Hundreds of thousands of viewers routinely watch with rapt attention, popcorn and cocktails in hand, as recognizable pieces from art history make their way to the upper echelons of grossly unattainable hammer prices. Pieces can often start with opening bids of tens of thousands of dollars and work their way up to multiple millions. Bidding increments alone can grow to sums unattainable for the average American family in several lifetimes.

Kenise Barnes Fine Art in Kent, Connecticut, wants to help make fine art more accessible. The 2026 version of the gallery’s annual “Cool and Collected” exhibition is subtitled “The Gift Edit” and features dozens of works by fine artists at prices that are much more in reach than an art-world outsider might expect. More than 30 artists contributed pieces to the show. Almost all available works are priced under $2,000, with many below $500. The collection features paintings, drawings, collage and ceramics.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit

Jennifer Terzian’s sanctuary for contemporary art

Jennifer Terzian’s sanctuary for contemporary art
Jennifer Terzian, founder of Jennifer Terzian Gallery in Litchfield.
Provided
The gallery is really meant to create a very intimate relationship with the artist and the story behind their work.
—Jennifer Terzian

On a recent crisp, fall afternoon in Litchfield, Jennifer Terzian welcomed a steady stream of collectors, artists, and art-world insiders into her jewel box of an art space on South Street, just off the town’s manicured historic Green.

The occasion was an opening for Jenny Kemp, an artist noted for balancing fluidity and structure in her abstractions through repetition, variation, and gradual shifts in hue. Hers is exactly the kind of tactile, process-driven work Terzian champions at a subterranean space that feels less like a commercial art gallery and more like stumbling into an impeccably edited sanctuary of contemporary thought.

Keep ReadingShow less
our community
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

Peter Cusack is finding the eternal in North Canaan

Peter Cusack is finding the eternal in North Canaan
Peter Cusack in his studio.
Provided

“I think art is the thing that allows us to feel there’s something in the universe that loves us,” said painter Peter Cusack in his new studio, a mid-19th-century stone church on Main Street in North Canaan.

For Cusack, art has always been a way of reaching toward something beyond the physical world. That sensibility runs through “Eternal: New, Recent, and Near Distant Paintings,” his upcoming exhibition in the church, a setting that seems an improbably good fit.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years at the Mahaiwe

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years at the Mahaiwe

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years together at the Mahaiwe Nov. 14

Heather Pollock

Now celebrating 40 years, Cowboy Junkies will perform Saturday, Nov. 14, at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

The band is celebrating its long career with a triple-vinyl retrospective album called “Open to Beauty,” featuring a selection of songs from 2000 onward, including material from its most recent release, “Such Ferocious Beauty.”

Keep ReadingShow less
concerts

Mike Selbach finds the extraordinary in everyday life

Mike Selbach finds the extraordinary in everyday life
“R46 Interior” (2026). Solid cherry and acrylic, 21” x 26.75” x 0.75”
Provided

Subway stations may seem unlikely places to encounter the divine, but amid the rumble of trains, the crush of commuters and the cavernous underground passageways, Salisbury artist Mike Selbach finds moments of unexpected beauty.

In “Subway Saints,” his solo exhibition opening Thursday, Nov. 12 at the Warren Family Gallery at Berkshire School in Sheffield, Massachusetts, Selbach transforms ordinary commuters and familiar transit spaces into sacred moments.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.