Yaddo opens up — briefly — to more than 1,000 awestruck visitors
The storied artist retreat’s first Open House in years offers a rare peek inside its mansion, a place usually reserved for creative greats.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY — As the post-rain sunshine heated up on Saturday, hundreds of people — about 1,200 in total — lined up outside of the historic Yaddo mansion on Union Avenue to attend its first open house in three years. The generous and rare opportunity included a peek inside not only the mythic mansion, but several other buildings on the grounds as well.
It took an army of 150 volunteers to keep the open house running like a well-oiled machine, from the first tour at 8:30 a.m. through the last one at 4:30 p.m. Guests were guided and directed from room to room on the first and second floors inside the mansion, before heading out to the West house — where Katrina Trask lived after husband Spencer Trask’s death — and then to see the newly completed Saratoga Studio, a live-work space on the north side of the property. Each tour ran about two and a half hours.
“I have visited the Yaddo grounds on numerous occasions, but I have never been able to explore inside the building,” says consulting winemaker Barbara Frank, who attended the Open House with a friend after originally being put on a waiting list. “The Tiffany windows were spectacular, and the beauty of the architecture was wonderful to witness.”
The Trasks founded the Corporation of Yaddo in 1900 with the idea of artists having a private retreat in which to create with “uninterrupted time and space.” That unwavering seclusion has created a formidable mystique over the years — as has the tragic story of the couple themselves. (All four of their children died young, for starters.) Saturday’s tours centered around the Trasks, with highlights including a look inside the couple’s bedrooms, the dining and music halls in the mansion, restored Victorian architecture, and Tiffany & Co.-stained glass windows and mosaics.
“We are so lucky to have Yaddo in Saratoga,” Frank says. “It is a great example of overcoming tragedy to create something truly exceptional. One of the docents said that rather than describe all of the artists who created the art in a particular space, he preferred to highlight that there is no other space in the world where there has been such an amazing concentration of artists over an extended period of time.”
“Yaddo has always been dedicated to the idea that artists need time, space and freedom to create work that resonates far beyond these grounds,” said Elaina Richardson, President of Yaddo, in a statement before the big event. “It is a joy to welcome our neighbors and supporters into the mansion, to share not only its beauty and history but also the sense of community that sustains the artists who come here.”
More than 7,500 artists — including Truman Capote, Sylvia Plath, David Foster Wallace, John Cheever and Leonard Bernstein — at all stages in their careers have revolved through Yaddo, spending between two weeks and two months at a time there working on their personal disciplines.
Proceeds from the weekend, including the sold-out VIP preview tour and reception on Friday evening, will directly support Yaddo residencies for writers, visual artists, composers, filmmakers and performance artists from around the world.
Keep reading about Yaddo!
For the first and only time this year, Yaddo swings open its gates
 |
|