Springs Eternal: Celebrating the Homegrown Legacy of Park and Brooks at the Leiber Collection

The Leiber Collection is currently presenting “Charlotte Park and James Brooks: Of This Place,” an exhibition celebrating the deep connection between two Abstract Expressionist pioneers and the natural landscape of Springs. The show runs through October 5. An opening reception was held Saturday, August 2.

Organized in collaboration with the Brooks-Park Home & Studios, the exhibition highlights how the unique light and setting of the East Hampton hamlet shaped the work of Charlotte Park and James Brooks, who lived and worked in Springs for more than four decades. Through a selection of paintings, prints and drawings, “Of This Place” illustrates the artists’ lifelong dialogue with their environment and their role within a renowned creative community that included Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner and Willem de Kooning.

Park was known for her lyrical, gestural style, while Brooks’s work reflected a bold, structured approach to abstraction. Both artists were central figures in postwar American art, and Springs served not just as a home, but as a source of enduring inspiration.

After relocating from Montauk following Hurricane Carol in 1954, Park and Brooks settled on an 11-acre wooded property in Springs in 1957. There, they built studios and made a life rooted in creativity, nature and artistic exchange. The site includes a studio designed by Brooks in 1959, a 19th-century timber-frame cottage and a relocated structure from Montauk’s Tar Works fishing community that once hosted friends like Pollock and Krasner.

The Brooks-Park property was purchased by the Town of East Hampton in 2013 through the Community Preservation Fund and designated a local historic landmark the following year. Despite ongoing preservation advocacy, the site remains in need of political support and dedicated funding.

The Leiber Collection is located at 446 Old Stone Highway in East Hampton and is open Saturdays, Sundays and Wednesdays from 1 to 4 p.m., or by appointment. For more information or to schedule a private viewing, contact Ann Stewart at info@leibercollection.org. Additional information about the Brooks-Park Home & Studios is available at brooks-parkarts.org.