BEACON - Award winning muralist Rick Price will host a public viewing of his new "River Beacons" mural-in-progress at his studio in the old high school in the city, at the corner of Verplanck and Fishkill avenues, from 4-5:30 p.m. Saturday.
The mural is sponsored by the Beacon Sloop Club and is scheduled to be on display at the corner of Cross and Main streets from March 2009 as one of Beacon's first official 2009 Quadricentennial projects.
The River Beacons mural celebrates Beacon's river town heritage and lifestyle, the Beacon Sloop Club's replica sloop Woody Guthrie's 30th anniversary, and the statewide Hudson-Fulton-Champlain Quadricentennial.
The painting, 15 feet high and 10 feet wide, will hang on the brick western wall of Riverwinds Gallery, on the corner of Cross and Main streets, facing Hudson Beach Glass. The location will make the mural highly visible to Beacon residents and visitors, inviting both to enjoy, preserve and celebrate the Hudson River and Beacon's river town heritage.
Supporters listed
Support for the mural has been received from the Dutchess County Arts Council, The Puffin Foundation, The Woody Guthrie Foundation, Michael Benzer of Hudson Beach Glass and private supporters.
Price received the arts council's 2007 County Executive Award for Art in Public Places for his mural on Beacon's Howland Public Library. The new mural is an official project of the Greater Beacon 2009 Quadricentenial Committee.
Price has chosen to frame the painting with the body of a female Esopus Indian figure, representing the bounteous energy that flows through the river community. The scenes and activities depicted on the Hudson's waters and surrounding land record the river's history - American Indian habitation, the passage of the Half Moon, the steamboat era - and reflect the diverse people, traditions, recreation and education that take place on the riverfront.
Recognizable elements in the mural of everyday river-related activity include the waterfront farmers market, environmental education at Beacon Sloop Club festivals, alternative energy use at Dia:Beacon, kayaking, folk singing, the kids from the Beacon Community Center painting river life, theWoody Guthrie and the Clearwater coasting along and the rainbow hued River Pool.
