LongHouse Reserve, East Hampton’s vital 16-acre sculpture garden and nature sanctuary, opened its 2025 season with a Spring Awakening celebration on April 5.
“This season will be our most welcoming ever. We have art, performances, conversations, craft workshops, and well-being activities for all”, said Director Carrie Rebora Barratt. “At LongHouse, we live with art in all forms, in a space between art and nature that brings joy into our lives. Our new installations are in harmony with the garden, and our highest priority is bringing friends together in places of peace.”
LongHouse sits at the intersection of art and nature, celebrating beauty and sustainability. The historic house and garden are a haven of inspiration and serenity. Named one of the top 15 most peaceful places in New York State, LongHouse is the largest open air cultural center in Long Island where the collections, gardens, art, and programs reflect world cultures and foster creative lives.
With most of the new works by women, the season is in many ways a celebration of the feminine spirit. Visitors will be inspired by new art from Hangama Amiri, Alice Hope, Jill Platner, and Vadis Turner. Permanent favorites by Buckminster Fuller, Sol LeWitt, Grace Knowlton, Yoko Ono, Barbara Shawcroft, Toshiko Takaezu, and renewed loans by Daniel Arsham, Maren Hassinger, Fitzhugh Karol, Mark Mennin, and Kenny Scharf welcome you back. Beautiful furniture designed by Paola Lenti invites all to rest, relax, and find respite.
Jill Platner’s exhibition, hanging throughout the Dawn Redwood Forest, is entitled Talking with Trees. With sculptures in various sizes tucked within tree branches, like fractals found in nature, her work replicates the patterns of nature, with their curves and bends, each one singular in design and movement, just as the trees they are integrated with. Jill creates a loving and lively experience where people can pause and engage with the abundance of nature around them, a meditative practice for both maker and viewer to serve as a reminder of our duty to conserve and celebrate our trees.
Vadis Turner’s single, powerful sculpture brings Venus, the goddess of Love, to LongHouse. Venus Rising will stand upright in the Red Garden, liberated from the home, like a weaving gone wild, created out of braided bedsheets cast in aluminum, with scalloped edges made with cast dining plates, referencing flora and flame, misbehavior, and transcendence.
In the Gallery will be a display of Afghan-Canadian artist Hangama Amiri, whose applique compositions tell stories based on memories of her homeland and diasporic experience.
Textile artist Barbara Shawcroft (1930 – 2023) was a friend of LongHouse Founder, Jack Lenor Larsen. She spent three years working in Jack’s studio at LongHouse. When she passed, her estate gifted LongHouse Cosmos 1996, to be displayed for the first time this season.
Mark Mennin’s exhibition of giant stone sculptures continues. Mennin’s monumental and expressive Portrait Heads capture the human face with exaggerated features, strong lines, and textured surfaces, playing with concave space within a boulder. The carved stone object is static and meditative in its quiet dialogue with the viewer who relates to its recognizable form. Mennin’s inverted carvings provide some extra layers of movement, interactivity, and visual illusion that are not usually associated with stone carving.
Mark your calendars—LongHouse Reserve kicks off the season with signature events, including Planters ON+OFF the Ground (June 13), the Summer Benefit: Luminosity (July 12), and Landscape Legends & Luncheon (September 12) with Charles Birnbaum.
Throughout the season, enjoy artist and author talks, architecture lectures, live performances, hands-on workshops, wellness classes, and garden tours—all celebrating creativity, nature, and community.
From Dog Days with ARF to bonsai and watercolor, there’s something for everyone at LongHouse this year.
