The Big Bayberry Bush by William Merritt Chase (The Parrish Art Museum, Water Mill, New York, Littlejohn Collection)
New York’s fabled Hamptons—where privet hedges hide grand estates and Modernist homes overlook the Atlantic surf—are more than an elite summer resort. The stark natural beauty of Long Island’s South Fork has inspired painters from William Merritt Chase and Childe Hassam to Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, and Lee Krasner.
Participants in a 5-day tour led by arts journalist Richard Selden encounter works by these artists and others at the Parrish Art Museum in the Southampton hamlet of Water Mill and at Guild Hall in the Village of East Hampton. The group also visits the former home and studio of Krasner and Pollock in the Town of East Hampton’s Springs neighborhood (the couple purchased the cottage, lacking heat and running water, for $5,000 in 1945) and the dune-bordered fishing village of Montauk at the island’s easternmost point.
Traveling from Washington, spend time in Brooklyn and visit Prospect Park—a favorite subject of Chase—and the Brooklyn Museum, coinciding with the opening of several galleries in its American Art wing after reinstallations. Enjoy two art-filled days in the Hamptons, then ferry across Long Island Sound to New London, Connecticut, for an afternoon in the charming village of Mystic. After a night in New Haven (at the Hotel Marcel, designed by Bauhaus master Marcel Breuer), the Yale University Art Gallery provides the tour’s concluding art experience on the return trip.
World Art History Certificate elective: Earn 1 credit*
Know Before You Go
- Cost includes bus transportation, lodging, all activities, admissions, fees, gratuities, and the following meals: 4 breakfasts, 4 lunches, and 4 dinners.
- Please note: The tour includes both indoor and outdoor walking and standing, as well as extended bus rides.
- Overnight accommodations are at the Hotel Indigo in Riverhead, New York (2 nights) and the Hotel Marcel, New Haven, Connecticut (1 night). Note one night's accommodations are TBA.
- Tour departs by bus from the Mayflower Hotel with a pick-up stop at the DoubleTree Hilton, Laurel, Maryland, at about 8:40 a.m.
- Single-room supplement $425 (factored into the Single Room Member and Single Room Non-Member pricing).
- Singles registering at the double-room rate are paired (on a nonsmoking basis) if possible, but must pay the single-room supplement otherwise.
- Detailed information is emailed to registrants about four weeks prior to departure.
- Participants are advised to purchase travel insurance for overnight and multi-day tours from a provider of your choice. Travel insurance provides additional coverage against unforeseen incidents that require last-minute cancellations.
General Information
- Registration for this tour will end by 2 p.m. ET on Friday, October 4, 2024.
- The tour departs by motorcoach from downtown Washington, DC with a designated secondary pick-up outside the city. Content delivered by the study leader on the way to the destination, after the secondary pick-up, is an integral part of the study tour experience. Meeting the group once the tour is en route is discouraged.
- Smithsonian Associates is a mask-friendly environment. Please feel free to bring and wear a mask at any time during a tour, both for your safety or the safety of others.
- As we aim to move away from single use water bottles, guests are strongly encouraged to get in the habit of bringing their own reusable water bottle on tour.
- For additional tour information:
*Enrolled participants in the World Art History Certificate Program receive 1 elective credit. Not yet enrolled? Learn about the program, its benefits, and how to register here.
