Arts

Its glossy, heavy stock and appealing, even sexy, Hollywood set-worthy pictures may have some mistaking the Main Street Historic District Guide for a more commercial endeavor.

    It’s the fourth year that the East Hampton Historical Society has mounted a family-oriented exhibit, “A Children’s World,” which features antique toys from the 1790s to the 1960s, but Richard Barons, the executive director of the society, seems as excited about the items on display as if it were the first time.

    The exhibit, which runs through the end of the year, “seemed logical when we started out — to do something for the whole family that’s free at this time of year,” Mr. Barons said.

New Show at Firestone

    Beginning Saturday, the Eric Firestone Gallery in East Hampton will present “Vincent Longo: Selected Works, 1960s and 1970.” Mr. Longo is a painter and printmaker who has been making art for almost six decades.

    The exhibit will include early paintings and works on paper influenced by Wassily Kandinsky and Abstract Expressionism and grid works inspired by Piet Mondrian.

    Some community choruses would appear to perform “The Messiah” practically every Christmas. It is a linchpin of the choral repertoire, it’s in English, and it tells the story of Christmas in a compelling way. Yet performing it so frequently turns the piece into something of a ritual for singers and audiences alike, and we should be grateful that our local Choral Society of the Hamptons sponsors more diverse programming. How much better to pull “The Messiah” out only occasionally, so that in hearing it again we are actually surprised by its greatness.

Holiday Show

    The Romany Kramoris Gallery has a holiday exhibit on view that includes the work of Shey Wolvek, Isabel Pavao, Jude Amsel, Christopher Engel, George Wazenegger, Laura Rozenberg, and Maria Orlova. It focuses on small works of art, and there will be special pricing on artists of the week. The show is up through Jan. 8 at the Sag Harbor gallery.

“Painter of Long Island”

    “Beautiful Tree, Severed Roots,” the cinematic journey Kenny Mann will offer viewers on Sunday at the Bay Street Theatre, is not strictly a memoir, although it is about her past. “It’s a story of identity,” she said, adding that others will be able to relate to the documentary. “So many people today are misplaced, it’s very relevant in today’s political climate.”

    The photographs in the Spanierman catalogue say it all. There she is with Hans Hofmann in his Provincetown, Mass., studio, then with Willem de Kooning in Springs, in a photo shoot with Ad Reinhardt, arm in arm with Lee Krasner, or standing confidently with her hand on her hip on an East Hampton beach with some of the greatest artists of the period in a 1962 Hans Namuth photograph.

    Cynthia Daniels has a voice meant for radio. Low in timbre, rich and melodic, it soothes the ears like warm buttered rum. Her radio shows, “MonkMusic Radio” and “On the Air at Crossroads,” showcase East End musicians playing and talking about their music.

    Tomorrow, those musicians will join her and her co-host Bonnie Grice at Guild Hall at a fund-raising event for it and WPPB 88.3FM, the Southampton public radio station that broadcasts her shows.

    Beginning tomorrow at 4 p.m., East Enders will have an opportunity to experience a classic story in a bygone way when Peconic Public Broadcasting at 88.3 FM presents a radio play of “A Christmas Carol,” produced and performed by members of the community.

    The hourlong piece, with British accents and sound effects, is the brainchild of Bonnie Grice, a host and producer at the radio station of shows such as “The Song Is You” and “Eclectic Cafe.” Michael Disher, a theater director for the Southampton Cultural Center and a drama teacher on the South Fork, is directing.

Two on the Rise

    Davenport and Shapiro Fine Arts in East Hampton will show the work of two artists, Eddie Rehm and Emanuel Buckyar, beginning tomorrow with a reception on Saturday from 5 to 9 p.m. Long Island painters, they are fresh to the scene but rising in reputation.

    “We were intrigued by the collaboration between two artists with distinct styles, one almost disturbingly energetic, and the other . . . calming for all its now almost classical allusions to the AbEx tradition,” said Leonard Davenport, a partner in the gallery.

    Japan has an early start in commemorating next year’s centennial of Jackson Pollock’s birth. Its Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art in Nagoya has opened an exhibit of some 60 of his works.

    The Studio Playhouse’s latest production is “Four,” a group of four one-act plays written by Long Island playwrights. It will be performed from next Thursday through Dec. 3 at LTV’s Studio 3 in Wainscott.

    The community group, which was formed earlier this year in collaboration with LTV, performed “Destry Rides Again” in June. This time they have plays by Frank Tangredi, Michelle Murphy, and Hortense Carpentier.

    John Chimples sat before two large screens at his house in Ditch Plain, Montauk, one day last month. He clicked a link and one of the screens came alive with the image of an older man wearing a wry smile and wrinkled features earned in ways that most human beings can barely imagine.

Birds have twigs and branches, and accommodate on lordly grasses. When in gardens we employ benches and chairs and, at times, a grounded tree trunk, our obliging constructs of metal, modified wicker, concrete and stone, as well as wood.

Fall Showing of the Alliance

    The Artists Alliance of East Hampton will present its fall art exhibit beginning tomorrow at Ashawagh Hall in Springs. The exhibit of work by 46 of its members will continue through Sunday.

    A reception will be held on Saturday from 5 to 7 p.m.

New Art at Demato

    The Richard Demato Gallery in Sag Harbor will open a new show of work by Kyla Zoe Rafert on Saturday with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m.

    The Drawing Room gallery, which was opened by Emily Goldtein and Victoria Munroe in an allée off the north side of Newtown Lane in East Hampton Village in 2004, has moved to a temporary spot farther west on the same street, next to Mecox Gardens and across from Waldbaum’s.

    “We outgrew the space two or three years ago,” said Ms. Munroe recently. Between that and knowing a year ago that they would have to leave their nook, they had been looking around and feel lucky to have found the space at 66 Newtown Lane.

    Picture a plethora of fans, cheering on their favorites as more and more participants are disqualified, sneaking forward to nab an autograph but perhaps secretly hoping to see an up-close “crash and burn” scenario.

    Sounds like the Indy 500, but it also describes the dance marathons of the 1930s.

The Italian poet Antonio Porchia once wrote, “Following straight lines shortens distances, and also life.”

    The fourth annual Hamptons Take 2 Documentary Film Festival, which highlights work by local filmmakers, will open on Friday, Nov. 18, with a tribute to the filmmaker Richard Leacock at Guild Hall from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.

    The evening begins with a cocktail reception, and then features two of Mr. Leacock’s documentaries, “Happy Mother’s Day,” and “Crisis.” D.A. Pennebaker, a fellow filmmaker, will lead a panel discussion on Mr. Leacock’s work afterward along with his children, Victoria Leacock Hoffman and Robert Leacock, also filmmakers, and Pam Wise.

Chase and Ebert Show

    The Halsey Mckay Gallery in East Hampton will show an installation of new work by Louisa Chase and Sally Egbert beginning Saturday. According to the gallery, the exhibit of paintings and works on paper will display “lyrical, bold, and intuitive works that operate more as natural and corporeal extrapolations rather than traditional abstract expressions.”

    What’s so funny about peace, love, and easy listening? Randy Parsons, an East Hampton songwriter and guitarist, has released something different: a CD for adults . . . quiet, thoughtful ones.

The Sixth Annual East End Black Film Festival, organized by the African-American Museum of the East End, will be presented tonight and tomorrow night at the Southampton Cultural Center and at the Parrish Art Musuem on Saturday from 12:30 to 9 p.m.

Hudson in New York

    The work of Judith Hudson, a part-time Amagansett resident, is now on view at Salomon Contemporary in West Chelsea. The show is called “Judith Hudson: Playboy Advisor” and includes works on paper from “Sex Advice Drawings.” This is a series that takes sex column dialogue and motifs and parodies them for maximum visual effect.

As with others who have chosen the East End as an artistic retreat, Rafael Ferrer, 78, who lives in Greenport, made his way here in a circuitous route, one that reflected his own journey in making art.

    Beginning on Saturday, Guild Hall will present “Contrabando,” an exhibit that started out as an abridged version of a much larger show at El Museo del Barrio in New York last year and ended up being something else entirely.

Two South Fork architectural firms walked away with distinction at the 47th annual American Institute of Architects-Long Island Chapter Archi Awards ceremony on Oct. 19 in Huntington.

Guild Hall will open three art shows this weekend with a reception on Saturday from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. — exhibits of work by Drew Shiflett and Rafael Ferrer (see related story) and a permanent-collection show.

     There is a feeling of excitement from the Avram Theater to Chancellors Hall at Stony Brook Southampton, the center for Southampton Arts. The burgeoning graduate arts program headed by Robert Reeves has recently added theater to its roster of offerings. There are already M.F.A. degree programs in creative writing and literature. Bringing the theater arts program to Southampton is a natural progression.

“The first time I saw the movie, it had a profound effect on me,” said Murphy Davis, the artistic director of the Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor. Mr. Davis is directing a stage version of Harper Lee’s classic drama “To Kill a Mockingbird” as part of the theater’s Literature Live series.

    An autumn day, after hard frost, and an early northeaster. An autumn day of Indian summer equal to that other stunner, that miracle, a languorous June afternoon when all is still. And painful. “The present usually hurts” — Blaise Pascal (“Pensées” No. 47).