Bits: Artists to Watch at Guild Hall, BCMF Celebrates Five 'Springs,' Quack About It

Artist to Watch: Mary Boochever Wins Top Honors in Guild Hall Member Exhibition

The results are in.

Artist Mary Boochever took Top Honors during the 81st annual Artist Member Exhibition at Guild Hall in East Hampton, as judged by Jocelyn Miller, curator for MoMA's PS1.

Amanda Church won Best Abstract, Jeanette Martone was awarded Best Representational Work and Stephanie Powell won Best Photograph. Best Work on Paper went to Marsha Gold Gayer, Best Sculpture to Monica Banks, Best Mixed Media to Barbara Dayton, and Best Pastel to Julie Spain.

Beth Lee is this year’s Best New Artist, and Daniel Jones won the Catherine & Theo Hios Best Landscape Award.

Honorable mentions include Check Baker, Geoff Kuzara, Joan Santos, Lindsay Morris, Linda Capello, Marilyn Church, Hilary Helfant and Darlene Charneco.

For more information, call (631) 324-0806 or visit guildhall.org.

BCMF Celebrates Five Seasons of ‘Spring’

Pianist Orion Weiss has a particular attachment to the East End, especially during the winter when it’s both quieter and colder, he said — “like walking around in a museum after hours, or maybe like being the first guest at a party.”

A Hamptons regular since he was 14 years old, many of his most inspiring and formative musical experiences have unfolded on the East End, from Pianofest in the Hamptons and The Perlman Music Program as a child, and now, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival as an adult.

Weiss will kick off the fifth annual series of spring concerts with Shai Wosner, who will perform a program of masterpieces by Schubert and Brahms, and two works for piano four-hands by David Lang, on Saturday, March 23, at 5 p.m. at the Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church, located at 2429 Montauk Highway.

“When we started our spring series five years ago, we knew that there were music lovers looking for more opportunities to hear excellent chamber music year round, and we have been thrilled by the overwhelming response from the community,” Artistic Director Marya Martin said in a press release. “We’ve put together a terrific set of programs and can’t wait to present them to our East End audience.”

The series continues on April 14 with the Jerusalem Quartet, who will make their Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival debut with two masterpieces of French quartet repertoire — those by Debussy and Ravel — and Bartók’s Fifth String Quartet. And on May 11, a rich program of German Baroque chamber music will be performed by flutist Marya Martin, oboist James Austin Smith, violinist Tien-Hsin Cindy Wu, cellist Nicholas Canellakis and Kenneth Weiss on harpsichord.

“Germany stood at the center of musical thinking during much of the Baroque period,” the press release said. “This program presents works from that heady time by some of the country’s greatest composers: the masters Handel, Telemann, and J.S. Bach, as well as Dietrich Buxtehude and Johann Fasch.”

The Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival’s 36th summer season will be announced in May. For subscriptions, single tickets priced at $40 and $60, and information on student tickets, call (917) 940-2983 or visit bcmf.org.

Go Ahead and Quack About It: New Book Shines Spotlight on Big Duck

Come March 25, fans of The Big Duck in Flanders will need to update their reading lists and make room for “The Big Duck and Eastern Long Island’s Duck Farming Industry” by Susan Van Scoy, the newest release from Arcadia Publishing, as part of its “Images of America” series.

Tracing the largely unknown history of the “Long Island Duck,” Van Scoy explores the origins of duck farming on the East End, starting with Atlantic Duck Farm in Speonk in 1858, though raising ducks did not take hold until the Pekin duck breed arrived from China in 1873, according to the author, who will give a talk and book signing on Tuesday, April 2, at 7:30 p.m. at the David W. Crohan Community Center in Flanders.

“By 1940, nearly 100 duck farms were concentrated mainly between Eastport and Riverhead. Today, due to environmental regulations and soaring costs, only one Long Island duck farm survives — Corwin’s Crescent Duck Farm in Aquebogue,” Van Scoy said in a statement. “However, many influences of the Long Island duck industry remain, such as The Big Duck, a duck-shaped building conceived by Martin Maurer in 1931 that was used to sell poultry and duck eggs, inspiring the famous term ‘duck’ architecture.”

Van Scoy is an assistant professor of art history at St. Joseph’s College in Patchogue and specializes in the history of photography and public, site-specific art. Images in the book are drawn from the photography collections of the National Archives, Suffolk County Division of Historic Services and The Post-Morrow Foundation, as well as numerous local families’ private collections.

Copies of the book will be available for $21.99, and a portion of the proceeds will benefit Friends of The Big Duck. For more information, visit flandersvillagehistoricalsociety.org.