Spend an afternoon walking among robots on the grounds of the Norman Rockwell Museum.

Autumn in the Berkshires is living art. The landscape is a canvas of colors – red, russet, orange, yellow, green, blue… It is interactive art at its finest.

The Norman Rockwell Museum has integrated this natural art into one of its exhibits. “An Outdoor Installation for the 21st Century” has been at the museum all summer and it lingers to stand against a backdrop of fall foliage. It will close October 31, 2011.

Have you seen the 2005 film Robots? If so, you have some idea of what you’ll find on the grounds of the Norman Rockwell Museum. Artists and craftspeople from all media were invited to submit sculptural robots inspired by the the film. The robots stand in stark contrast to the traditional paintings inside the museum, and the pastoral landscape surrounding it.

It’s worth a look.

Come spend a few days at our Berkshires Bed and Breakfast. The Applegate Inn is located in Lee Massachusetts, just a few miles from Stockbridge and the Norman Rockwell Museum. It takes about fifteen minutes to drive to the museum from here, and less than 45 minutes to bike there.

For more information about “An Outdoor Installation for the 21st Century”, please visit the Norman Rockwell Museum.

To book a room, please see our Berkshires Bed and Breakfast reservation page.

Rembrandt: Self-Portrait in a Fur Hat.

Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn lived from 1606 to 1669. He was drawn to art at a young age and quickly mastered all he was taught. By the time he was 22 years of age, he had developed a reputation as an excellent artist. Students flocked to him from that point on.

Edgar Degas lived from 1834 to 1917. He left school at a young age in order to study art. Degas spent years copying the works of Renaissance Masters, and had drawn and painted over 700 such copies by the time he was 13. Rembrandt, who made self-portraits throughout his life, was one of the masters studied closely by Degas.

Guests of our Bed and Breakfast in the Berkshires will soon have the opportunity to see many of the early works of Rembrandt and Degas at The Clark Art Institute.  Rembrandt and Degas: Two Young Artists opens November 13, 2011. The exhibit runs through February 5, 2012, when it moves to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

The Clark is the first United States stop of the tour of Rembrandt and Degas: Two Young Artists. The exhibit comes to the Massachusetts Berkshires directly from the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, where it originated. It is a collaboration of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Clark Art Institute, and the Rijksmuseum.

If you can’t make it to our Lenox Bed and Breakfast this October to see magnificent fall foliage, head here this winter to see magnificent art.

More information about the exhibit may be found at The Clark.

I wish I could have seen that! What a wonderful Berkshires Activity!

The group sights their inspirations as Johnny Appleseed, traveling medicine shows, nomadic jewel box theater, the long tradition of river raft-builders and of course Mark Twain. The crew set out to meet new people and exchange ideas, art and inspiration. The collective was motivated in part by a desire to reclaim

The Miss Rockaway Armada Afloat on the Mississippi

and reinvent the age-old longing to roam this vast, mysterious country. In their words, “We still live in a country that fights wars so it can consume more. We are taking the urge to flee and heading for the center.” With that in mind, the Mississippi River seemed like the perfect avenue for the artists to explore. “We suspect that there is something wildish about seeing the stars night after night from the grand old Mississippi. Yeah sure, the Colorado is prettier, and the Rio Grande is its own divide, but the Mississippi has always been the main artery of this country. We wanted to start where the blood flows straight from the heart.”

At MASS MoCA the Miss Rockaway Armada will transform the Hunter Center Mezzanine — a place where students and other visitors gather to eat lunch and discuss their museum experiences — into a dynamic, interactive space. Using wood and other materials salvaged from MASS MoCA’s campus, the group will craft an environment that exudes the aesthetic, vision, and essence of The Miss Rockaway Armada’s experiences on the Mississippi River. Their idea was to build a “new, fantastical environment that inspires a sense of possibility and wonder”. As one Miss Rockaway crew member explains: “Let’s treat our MASS MoCA experience like a small-town stop on the way down the Hoosic River. Let’s make it current and as much about mutual inspiration, doing the impossible, building something new and crazy, cultural exchange, and direct interaction as the original Miss Rockaway voyage.” The environment includes tables and chairs for groups to gather and eat lunch, as well as ‘individual idea’ stations, where visitors will have opportunities to record their thoughts and stories and contribute to the installation.

Like I have said so many times before, living in the Berkshires is a gift for me. The Berkshire cultural events and other Berkshire activities make this area so wonderful to visit year-round, and for those of us that live here, we are truly lucky!