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

Roeliff Jansen Library plans gala fundraiser June 8

Roeliff Jansen Library plans gala fundraiser June 8

A June 8 fundraiser at Catamount will continue the Roeliff Jansen Community tradition of funding the library largely through private donations. A prime example of cummunity support came when longtime patron Charlotte Shutts’ will provided funds to pay off the mortgage of this building when she died in 2022.

B. Doktor

COPAKE — Fun, food, music and a wide range of auction items will be the main features at the Roeliff Jansen Community Library’s annual fund raising gala to be held on Saturday, June 8 from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the Catamount Lodge at 78 Catamount Road in Hillsdale.

Library Director Tammy Gaskell is hoping for “a big response” as it is the library’s major fundraiser for the year with the proceeds going to supplement the general budget, only 30 percent of which is provided through town taxes.

A tradition for more than a decade, with the last three events at Catamount, Gaskell is hopeful the weather will again co-operate, allowing guests to take advantage of the ample space inside and “gorgeous view” outside. While the event is still known by its traditional “gala” designation, Gaskell says dress for the event will be “casual.”

Catamount will be supplying the buffet which she says will include BBQ, Mediteranean, Asian and vegetarian choices, local craft beer and wine, and Prosecco, with ice cream, coffee and tea.

Throughout the evening, The Luke Franco Trio will fill the air with jazz.

A highlight of the evening will be expanded silent and live auctions conducted by Copake auctioneer Steven Chickery.

A sampling of the items from the live auction include a fly-fishing adventure for two, a tree delivered and installed, a party for 20 at Vanderbilt Lakeside in Philmont, a lunch prepared by New York Times bestselling cookbook author and food personality and influencer Dan Pelosi, and 18 holes of golf at the Copake Lake Country Club.

A more complete listing of both the live and silent offerings will be available at roejanlibrary.org/fundraising-events.

Individual tickets for the evening are $125 each for regular tickets and $275 for host tickets with those host patrons being listed in the gala program.

Rather than having paper tickets, all attendees names will be listed at the door. Tickets may be purchased at the library, through a PayPal link on the above website, or send a check to: Roe Jan Community Library, PO Box 669, Hillsdale, NY 12529.

Gaskill says that donations are also always welcome. The website notes those contributions as well as the tickets are tax deductable.

For more information, call 518-325-4101.

Latest News

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
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
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 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
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
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
google preferred source

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

google preferred source

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