BRATTLEBORO-The 50th anniversary of River Gallery School (RGS) is gearing up for its popular “Off the Wall” exhibit opening, followed by a Nov. 7 golden anniversary gala at the Retreat Farm’s North Barn.
For the art school that serves all ages, it’ll be, says Executive Director Kimberly Carmody, a combined “big birthday party and our beloved fundraiser,” back after a year off.
Off the Wall offerings, which are donated by artists to raise money for RGS, can be viewed online and, starting this Friday at Gallery Walk, in Gallery 34 on the school’s first floor at 34 Main St. through October.
Then, the exhibit will move to North Barn to be rehung for the gala and the much-anticipated lottery draws.
“This is the art lottery where everybody wins,” Carmody explains. “Everyone who buys a lottery ticket walks away with a framed piece of art.”
Over 100 pieces have been donated to Off the Wall, works by a range of artists including Barbara Merfeld Campman, Ric Campman, Finn Campman, John Cassin, Kate Follett, Mary Giammarino, Jim Giddings, Mallory Lake, Gordon Meinhard, Petria Mitchell, David Rohn, Helen Schmidt, Cameron Schmitz, Ross Smart, Melody Squires, Doug Trump, and many others.
“The lottery is pretty much a game,” says Carmody. “People make lists of their favorite pieces, numbered 1 to 20. Then you come to the event and get a lottery number. When your number comes up, if you’re the first person to be chosen, you get first pick. But if you’re the 30th or 50th or 80th person, a lot of pieces will have already gone. So you have to keep track of your list to see what’s already been taken and what hasn’t.”
“Remarkably,” she says, more than 90% of participants end up with a piece from within the top 12 on their lists. And, she adds, people can play remotely, a boon for “friends and family that live out of town.”
Gala tickets include the artwork and “a thoughtfully curated catering experience showcasing some of the best flavors Brattleboro has to offer,” Carmody writes in her description of a collaborative dinner that “reflects the creativity and character of Brattleboro’s vibrant food community.” Dinner-only tickets are available too.
Siblings Colette and Jace Phoenix, students at the Brattleboro Music Center, will play a mix of traditional and classical tunes on violin and guitar.
“We’ll have birthday cupcakes for everybody,” Carmody says, and RGS memorabilia from through the decades will be displayed, including “really old T-shirts, print material, and posters — all going way back to the ’70s.”
In December, RGS will mount “Seeds of the Future: A Youth Art Exhibition.” Then, capping off 50th anniversary festivities, Making Is Knowing, a documentary about the school, will screen at Brattleboro’s Latchis Theatre on Saturday, Feb. 27, 2027.
The film recognizes and honors the RGS teaching philosophy that the cofounders, Ric Campman and his wife, Barbara Merfield Campman, developed over the years. The film shares the title of a book by RGS co-founder Ric Campman and Lydia Thompson, the school’s artistic director emerita.
“It’s remarkable because [that philosophy] is what differentiates River Gallery School from many arts-based nonprofits and organizations, not only in town but all over the world,” Carmody says.
What RGS founders “saw as most important was opening a pathway for individual people to develop a relationship with their own creativity,” she continues. “So what they focused on from the very start — and I came the day the school opened when I was 7 years old — is each individual’s own creativity.”
Carmody writes that for “five decades, River Gallery School has been shaped by the people who have learned, taught, created, volunteered, offered support, and found community there.”
Making Is Knowing brings their stories together and “honors the generations of people who built the school and celebrates the pivotal role RGS now plays in bringing art-making experiences out into the community with local partnerships.”
Programs include Ability Arts, Art in Schools, Art for New Vermonters, Creative Aging, and “pop-up experiences with local businesses,” Carmody says.
“[The film] celebrates the importance of connecting with our own creativity, and with one another,” she says.
The February screening marks, too, the conclusion of the RGS anniversary fundraising campaign, a board-led initiative to raise $100,000 beyond the school’s annual operating budget.
As rich as the history of RGS is, so is the body of RGS alumni.
“We had a whole series of exhibitions in Gallery 34 this year” to celebrate, including “the shared legacy show of the Campman family,” a retrospective of art by Ric and Barbara Campman and their extended family.
That show drew hundreds of people who “had not been to the school or seen one another in decades,” she said. “It was so moving, honestly. It was amazing.”
And “something similar happened with the July show” of photographs by Robert George, a photojournalist and local street photographer who has documented life in Brattleboro for four decades and “who has many, many connections and friends dating back to the ’70s,” Carmody says.
“The opening reception for Bob was packed: he basically just sat on a stool and held court for over three hours,” she notes.
‘It’s kind of my anchor’
For Carmody and her colleagues, the anniversary shines a light on the role that RGS plays in the community and its effect not only on diehard, lifelong students and teachers, but also those new to RGS — and new to art.
“I didn’t start doing art until a little after my 80th birthday,” just last year, says RGS student Stephen Minkin. “And then suddenly my brain chemistry changed and I had to do it. Really amazing.”
Telling of his shift, he explains, “my first workshop was probably about a year ago, and then I got totally sucked in because I started working with canvas and with colors.”
He adds he’s now working with wood, too.
“I lament the fact that for so many decades I had only a superficial relationship with [RGS], but now it’s central to my existence,” says Minkin, whose career path has been complex — and peripatetic.
“I’ve been prolific, thanks to the school as much as anything else, you know. The school enabled me to become an artist. It’s kind of my anchor. In the Tuesday night studio, we all work on our own stuff: It’s great because of the interactions with other students. We all support each other’s work.”
Of the studio mentor, Eric Cutler, Minkin says “he’s such an amazing teacher in terms of giving you the support you need. He shows, without being pedantic, how deeply you can look at something.”
Fall classes for children as well as for adults have started in a semester that runs through December. After seeing “incredible enrollment this past winter and spring,” Carmody says, “I’m hopeful that this fall will continue with really high enrollment.”
She attributes that popularity “to people wanting to literally do things with their hands and physically get involved in something that’s not on a screen,” she adds.
Carmody highlights community, too.
“A lot of artists that have their own studios at home still come here to studio classes or to specific classes in different mediums because of the community aspect,” she observes.
Carmody says that artists at RGS can practice being “physically engaged and able to explore and experiment and figure out the possibilities and limitations of the material in real time, and make mistakes, and do things over, and wander around the studios if you need to, or get a cup of tea, or whatever it is.
“[It’s about that] combined with people really valuing a place to go where they can be themselves and feel safe and also talk to people,” she says.
And such, Carmody notes, is what RGS works to sustain.
For information on all classes at River Gallery School and to view Off the Wall art and purchase gala tickets, visit rivergalleryschool.org.
This Arts item by Annie Landenberger was written for The Commons.