Willard Metcalf at Old Lyme

OLD LYME, CONN.

:Hailed in his time as the "poet laureate" of the New England hills, Willard Metcalf (1858-1925), after a long period of neglect, has recently regained his standing as one of America's finest Impressionist painters. Metcalf created tranquil, harmonious landscapes that retain their appeal and charm to this day. Particularly noteworthy are his splendid paintings of winter.

In his relentless search for ideal subjects during his mature years, Metcalf made frequent forays from his New York City base to scenic places throughout his native New England. He found inspiration in western Massachusetts and Vermont, in midcoast Maine and in the art colonies of Cornish, N.H., and Old Lyme. His sojourns at Miss Florence Griswold's celebrated boarding house in the latter community changed the course of his career and led to some of his finest achievements.

It is fitting, therefore, that the Florence Griswold Museum should organize and host "May Night: Willard Metcalf at Old Lyme," on view through September 11.

In what the museum properly terms "an unprecedented synthesis of Metcalf's greatest loves - art and the natural world," more than 40 paintings are displayed alongside the painter's collections of precisely organized and labeled birds' eggs and nests, moths and butterflies. Indeed, the Griswold has the largest public collection of Metcalf artifacts, ranging from paintings, pastels and silverpoints to sketchbooks, a diary and a natural history cabinet of "curiosities." The latter, a tall wooden collection chest with 28 drawers containing eggs, nests, moths and butterflies, is exhibited publicly for the first time.