Monadnock Art

Monadnock Art https://monadnockart.org The landscape here seems to nourish creative energy.

We are preparing for Open Studio Art Tour 2026: October 10,11, &12 Join us this year for the quintessential fine art journey through the Monadnock Region. 65 studios featuring over 70 artists! Monadnock Art is a non-profit organization with a mission of celebrating the presence of the visual arts in the Monadnock Region of southwestern New Hampshire, from the artists who gathered in and near Dubli

n at the turn of the 19th century to the hundreds of artists who live and work throughout the region today. At the end of the 19th century artists were drawn to the area by its bracing scenery and the inspiration of Mount Monadnock. They cultivated a unique community centered on the arts, and today we strive to follow their example. In 2007, "Monadnock Art" was added to the original name to better communicate the range of programs and services for artists and those who appreciate the arts. It is unlikely the group of artists who worked in and near Dublin over one hundred years ago would be surprised to know the arts continue to thrive in the towns around Mount Monadnock. Over the years, Monadnock Art has produced and sponsored a variety of programs, notably the Annual Open Studio Art Tour in early October. On this weekend more than 50 artists in the towns around Mount Monadnock open their studios to the public. The Tour itself is free, and many artists offer work for sale specially priced for this event. Other programs have included a film series, lectures, special exhibitions, and video documentaries about artists associated with what is now referred to as the Dublin Art Colony, as well as an Educational Outreach project to connect artists with local school. Monadnock Art has contributed toward the purchase of paintings by Dublin artists for the permanent collections of the Thorne-Sagendorph Art Gallery and the Historical Society of Cheshire County in Keene. We will continue to update the web site to add information about our programs and services.

09/04/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Joan Cunningham ✨

What if creating art was a little like walking through the woods? Slowing down, looking closely, listening carefully, and allowing curiosity to lead the way. For Joan Cunningham, a Monadnock Art member, the process of making art is exactly that kind of exploration.

Joan combines collage, painting, printmaking, photography, and digital illustration, creating works through what she describes as a “collaborative conversation with the materials.” Rather than imposing a predetermined outcome, she allows the colors, textures, forms, and materials to influence where the work goes.

Living in the beautiful Monadnock region has helped to shape Joan’s artistic practice. Her work explores our kinship with nature and our place within the "more-than-human world," drawing inspiration from the intricate visual language found all around us.

She is particularly fascinated by the elegant balance between randomness and order in nature, the way organic forms, textures, colors, and patterns come together in ways that are both unpredictable and beautifully harmonious.

Come discover Joan’s work on the Monadnock Open Studio Art Tour!
📍 Studio 36,Hancock, NH
🎨 Meet Joan, explore her work, and experience the many ways she brings the textures and rhythms of the natural world into her art.

09/01/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Peggy Van Valkenburgh ✨

Sometimes the tools we use to understand the world become the tools we use to create art. For Peggy Van Valkenburgh, that tool has always been color.

A Monadnock Art member and member of the New Hampshire Pastel Society, Peggy has spent a lifetime combining observation, curiosity, and art. Living in Peterborough and spending summers in Michigan have given her endless opportunities to observe the landscapes and moments of beauty that inspire her work.

Peggy’s artistic education began in high school studio classes and continued through frequent visits to the Detroit Institute of Arts. She later became a middle school science teacher, where she found an unexpected way to bring art into the classroom. She used colored chalk to create diagrams and visual explanations that helped her students understand complex scientific concepts. For Peggy, art was a way of communicating.

After years of teaching, she discovered soft pastels and quickly fell in love with their extraordinary depth and intensity of color. She began studying with artists in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, and Michigan, and what started as an exploration soon became a passion.

Today, Peggy paints daily in her studio, primarily working from photographs she has taken herself. She also enjoys sketching and plein-air painting, allowing her to experience and interpret the landscape directly. After twelve years of working with soft pastels, Peggy says she has made “countless new best friends”—her pastels. 💛

👩‍🎨 Meet Peggy on the Monadnock Open Studio Art Tour!
📍 Studio 55 — Peterborough, NH
📅 October 10–12
⏰ 10 AM–5 PM

08/30/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Audrey Carrel ✨

For Audrey Carrel, fiber art began with a gift from her Ukrainian grandmother: the art of knitting. Taught as a young child, Audrey developed a distinctive way of holding and throwing her yarn—one she was once told was “weird” or “wrong.” Years later, at a fiber festival in Edinburgh, she discovered that her technique was actually a traditional Eastern European method, shared by a French woman with the same heritage. Suddenly, what had seemed unusual was revealed as a beautiful connection to her family’s traditions.

Today, Audrey creates unique, one-of-a-kind shawls and knitted pieces, often without a pattern. Rather than dictating exactly where the work will go, she follows the lead of the yarn and allows shapes and forms to emerge naturally as she knits.

“I find myself following where the yarn leads me,” Audrey says, creating one-of-a-kind knits that feel less like garments and more like works of art that can be worn and enjoyed.

That philosophy extends to Meka Farm & Homegoods, the small fiber farm in southwestern New Hampshire that grew from a humble beginning with 15 chickens, followed by a pig, goats, and eventually a bottle lamb. Twelve years later, the farm is home to sheep whose fleeces become beautiful, locally sourced yarn. Each undyed batch of yarn is even named after the individual sheep it came from.

At Meka Farm, Audrey offers hand-dyed and undyed yarn, hand-knit clothing and crafts, sheepskins from local farms, and an eclectic collection of handmade goods. Her creative offerings include original knit-and-dye kits, handmade potholders and mats, lanolin and beeswax balms, farm-animal note cards, and the delightfully irreverent “Knitting because Murder is Wrong” mugs and stickers.

Visit Audrey during the Monadnock Art Tour at studio 37 in Hancock!

For more information about the tour visit our website➡ https://monadnockart.org/

08/27/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Lulu Fichter ✨

What happens when an artist creates a piece and then lets nature finish it?

Meet Lulu Fichter, a Monadnock Art member whose unique porcelain “fossilized artifacts” are created through a fascinating collaboration between the artist and the natural world.

Lulu forms each piece by hand from porcelain and fires it before placing it directly on a riverbed for two months. During that time, water, sediment, and microorganisms become part of the creative process, shaping the surface and determining the final outcome of each individual piece. The result is an earthy, organic quality that feels as though it has been unearthed rather than made. Each piece carries the marks of its journey, the subtle textures, colors, and impressions created by the river itself.

“I love that, not only is my work inspired by nature, but that I am also allowing nature to interact with my work, to become a part of it.” The results are one of a kind pieces.

Come see Lulu’s remarkable work in person on the Monadnock Art Open Studio Tour!

📍 Studio 53 Peterborough, NH
📅 October 10–12
⏰ 10 AM–5 PM

For more information and a digital tour map visit our website at: https://monadnockart.org/monadnock-art-open-studio-tour/

WIP: Work in Progress Wednesday. Here is a glimpse of what our artists have been working on. 🖼️ Gallery Exhibition Openi...
08/26/2026

WIP: Work in Progress Wednesday. Here is a glimpse of what our artists have been working on.

🖼️ Gallery Exhibition Opening Oct 3, 4-7 pm at the Monadnock Center for History and Culture
📅 October 10-12, 10 am- 5 pm
➡️ Visit https://monadnockart.org/monadnock-art-open-studio-tour/ for more information about the tour

08/24/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Kipp Miller ✨

Today Monadnock Art recognizes Kipp Miller, an artist whose work begins in some of the most unexpected places: forest floors, ocean shores, abandoned factories, railbeds, roadside ditches, and even village dumps. Wood, glass, stone, iron, and bone—materials that have been bruised, broken, overlooked, or forgotten have become the starting point for Kipp’s remarkable creations. With an intuitive approach, he gives these discarded items a new life and a new story.

A self-described outsider artist with no formal art education, Kipp comes from a strong history of art in his heritage. His grandmother was a Cooper Union-trained portrait and landscape painter who also designed and produced theatrical interiors in turn-of-the-century New York City. His father was a sculptor who carved and cast gold dental restorations for both the famous and infamous.

Kipp chose his own artistic path. Rather than beginning with pristine materials, his work emerges from what has already lived a life. He works primarily with paint and “hand-powered” tools—if tools are used at all—allowing the inherent character, imperfections, and history of each found object to remain part of the finished work.

And Kipp’s work continues to evolve beyond the original objects. When his creations are reproduced as Giclée prints on Hahnemühle Bamboo paper, they take on an entirely different appearance and, in a sense, an entirely new life.

You can see Kipp's work during the Monadnock Art Tour October 10-12, at studio 52 in Peterborough. For more information on the tour visit ➡ https://monadnockart.org/monadnock-art-open-studio-tour/

08/18/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Joseph Caracappa ✨

Monadnock Art is delighted to spotlight Joseph Caracappa, a longtime member of our organization and former President of the Monadnock Art Board of Trustees.

A self-taught artist living in Peterborough, Joseph has developed a distinctive signature style he describes as figurative abstract oil painting. His work has an unmistakable vibrancy. Rich layers of colorful oil paint move across the canvas in expressive swirls and curves, creating paintings that feel both contemporary and wonderfully timeless.

Joseph’s figures often appear in groups, dressed in intricate, colorful patterns that invite the viewer to explore the relationships and stories within the composition. His landscapes take a different but equally energetic approach, transforming familiar scenes into vivid worlds of swirling shapes, movement, and color.

There is something wonderfully recognizable about a Joseph Caracappa painting. His classical choice of oil paint meets an exuberant style, resulting in work that is joyful, energetic, and full of personality. And, as Joseph says, he tries to “insert a little fun and always a lot of color” into his paintings.

You can see Joseph's work during the Monadnock Art Tour Oct 10-12, 10 am- 5 pm, at Studio 49 in Peterborough.
For more information about our artists go to
➡ https://monadnockart.org/members/

08/17/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: David Woodward ✨

Get ready for a burst of color, wit, and pop culture when you visit David Woodward on this year’s Monadnock Art Tour!

David’s work brings together bold color, creative energy, popular icons, comics, phrases, and typography to create vibrant pop art that reflects the world around us— sometimes profound, sometimes absurd, and often both at once.

With a background in graphic design and a deep love of painting, David creates work designed to grab your attention. But look a little longer and you’ll often discover something more. His paintings are layered with symbolic juxtapositions, playful metaphors, texture, and collage, inviting you to look beyond the initial “pop” and uncover the deeper narrative underneath.

David is constantly experimenting with new materials, surfaces, and techniques, allowing his work to evolve and push the boundaries of his creative expression. The result is art that is energetic, playful, visually compelling and just a little bit thought-provoking.

You can meet David on the Monadnock Art Tour at Studio 61, where he will be joining fellow artist Lita Judge as a guest artist!

This is definitely a must-stop studio on the tour! Come see David’s vibrant work in person.

For more information about David Visit
➡ https://monadnockart.org/profile/davidwoodward/

08/14/2026

✨ Artist Spotlight: Chris Reid ✨

Monadnock Art is delighted to spotlight Chris Reid, an internationally respected New Hampshire artist whose plein-air landscapes and still life paintings are celebrated for their intense color, masterful use of light, and engaging sense of movement.

Often found outdoors with pastels in hand, Chris captures the rich fields, meadows, wetlands, and farmland of New Hampshire, translating the landscape into vibrant works filled with energy and atmosphere. Her paintings invite us not only to see a place, but to experience it.

Jurors have praised the way Chris combines expressive line, color, value, and temperature to draw viewers into the landscape and visual technique. One juror described her work as bringing the viewer into “the experience of the wetland depicted, and the experience of the act of creating…a work of art.” Another praised her lyrical landscapes and the movement of her pastel strokes, while noting how unexpected touches of color can transform an entire composition.

Chris’s work has been featured in juried and international exhibitions throughout New England, New York, and Canada, including three consecutive International Association of Pastel Societies exhibitions. Her many honors include awards from the Pastel Society of America, American Pastel Society, Connecticut Pastel Society, Pastel Society of New Hampshire, Jack Richeson, and numerous other regional and national exhibitions.

A dedicated educator as well as an artist, Chris holds a B.S. in Art Education from SUNY College at Buffalo and studied in Italy at the University of Siena. She completed graduate studies at the American School of Crafts at Rochester Institute of Technology and has taught at the New Hampshire Institute of Art, Sharon Arts Center, and in public and private schools. Today, she continues to share her knowledge through private courses and lessons.

Chris is a juried artist of the New Hampshire Art Association, a juried associate of the Pastel Society of America, and a member of several pastel societies and arts organizations, including Monadnock Art/Friends of the Dublin Art Colony. She has also generously served on the Board of Directors of the Jaffrey Civic Center.

We are so pleased to have Chris Reid as a member of Monadnock Art and to celebrate the beauty, energy, and extraordinary color she brings to the New Hampshire landscape.

Be sure to follow Monadnock Art as we continue introducing you to the talented artists who make our region such a special place for creativity and inspiration.

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19 Grove St
Dublin, NH
03444

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