Staten Island SEEN
Audio Stories by APMD
Remember the Mastodon
Opening the Treasure Box
From Farm to City
Field Notes: Seed Stories and the Power of Plants
Impractical Jokers: Homecoming
We Are Here: Superstorm Sandy and Her Aftermath on Staten Island
Staten Island in Photographs: Images from the History Archives and Library of Staten Island Museum
Staten Island Museum at Snug Harbor, 1000 Richmond Terrace
The Staten Island Foundation Gallery 1, South and Gallery 2, North
View the full Staten Island SEEN catalogue here.
Updated January 2017: After a successful run of one year, about half of our inaugural exhibition, Staten Island SEEN has been taken down to make way for our latest offering, Infinite Compassion. You can still view parts of Staten Island SEEN on the second floor in the Elizabeth Egbert Gallery.
Staten Island (re)SEEN
When the Staten Island Museum at Snug Harbor opened in September 2015, visitors could explore artistic representations of the borough's varied landscape through the exhibition Staten Island SEEN. Featuring 59 works dating from 1679-2015, the exhibition spanned two galleries and included paintings, drawings, prints, stereopticon photos, and a 3D video. While most pieces were from the Museum's collection, some items were loaned, and 11 were new works made by contemporary artists expressly for the exhibition. The range of works originally on display is documented in a lushly illustrated catalogue, accompanied with text by historian Barnett Shepherd and Staten Island Museum Curator of Art, Robert Bunkin.
In September 2016, Staten Island SEEN was de-installed from The Staten Island Foundation Gallery on the first floor to make way for the Museum's newest exhibition, Infinite Compassion: Avalokiteshvara in Asian Art. However, the Elizabeth Egbert Gallery on the second floor is still home to Staten Island SEEN… with some changes.
Loaned works have been returned to their owners; but signature pieces that were downstairs, such as Jasper F. Cropsey's panoramic Looking Oceanward from Todt Hill, are now found in the second floor gallery, and additional works from the Museum's collection have been added, creating a new gallery experience.
Visitors can see a map of Staten Island dating from 1859 and a bird's eye view of Stapleton, published in 1905, both from the Museum's archives. There are also three paintings by Cecil Bell: An early "classic" Bell called Welcoming the Queen Mary, last seen in the 2014 exhibition Industrial Sublime at the Hudson River Museum, Yonkers and Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, FL; a late work, St. Paul's Avenue, and Roof Tops – Winter (1959), both depicting scenes from Bell's studio window. Other works from prominent artists that have been added include Edward Moran's View of Narrows Looking North and Ned Gannon's Spring. But not everything has changed: Visitors can still don their 3D glasses and view SI3D, Jerome and Marylou Bongiorno's city-symphony inspired art film commissioned for the exhibit.
With its new additions and shifted focus to 19th-21st century views, Staten Island SEEN should definitely be seen again.
Learn more about Staten Island SEEN here.
Featured Artists:
Living Artists - Marylou & Jerome Bongiorno, Brian Brooks, Nicholas Evans-Cato, Ned Gannon, Diana Horowitz, Amer Kobaslija, Cynthia Mailman, Ron Milewicz, Bill Murphy, Morgan Taylor, Peter Van Dyck, and Sarah Yuster.
Historic Artists - Isaac Almstaedt, Ely M. Behar, Louis George Bouché, John Bradley, Alfred DeGiorgio Crimi, Jasper Francis Cropsey, Henry Ernest Schnakenberg, John French Sloan.
STATEN ISLAND MUSEUM EXHIBITION TEAM
Elizabeth Egbert, Robert Bunkin, Donna Pagano, Diane Matyas, Audrey Malachowsky, Claire Aniela Arthurs
Barnett Shepherd
EXHIBITION PLANNING AND DESIGN
Staten Island Museum
Technical Artistry, New York, New York
EXHIBITION FABRICATION
1220 Exhibits, Inc. Nashville, Tennessee
CONSER VATORS
Rhonda Feinman Custom Frames, Inc. Woodside, New York
Reiger Art Conservation, LLC, New York, New York
Sherman Art Conservation, Sea Cliff, New York
AUDIO PRODUCER
David Tarnow, Toronto, Ontario Canada