What's Happening here? Growth! Come see.
Our old friends and supporters will visit this site and wonder at the changes.
New visitors will come looking for information about the historic center established in 1997.
While we have not moved our site at 518 Pleasant Street, our moniker has been updated.
We have become the New England Visionary Artists Museum in response to our expanded mission.
New visitors will come looking for information about the historic center established in 1997.
While we have not moved our site at 518 Pleasant Street, our moniker has been updated.
We have become the New England Visionary Artists Museum in response to our expanded mission.
Anchor House of Artists established in 1997.
Artists from all walks of life must see themselves for what they accomplish with their hands; they need not view themselves through the world’s filtered lens. In November 1997, from his small studio, Michael Tillyer invited artists he had come to know who lived with neurodiverse conditions, serious mental illnesses (SMI), in the language of those times, as he had wrestled with, to share in studio life to the end that they could redefine their lives through their work. This mission became the Anchor House of Artists.
After 25 years of success, while the studio project was still at the center, expectable outgrowths emerged:
In 2017, acting on an inevitable calling, an expanded mission emerged. Over the decades, founding member artists passed away, leaving their intellectual property, artworks, and writings to our care. The call for our stewardship was answered with the launch of the New England Visionary Artists Museum. Intentionally named an artist’s museum, it grew out of the spirit that art is only incidental to the lives of the creative hands that fashion it, thus placing our emphasis on the will of the artist to speak through the medium of their accomplishments. This is the spirit: art is incidental to the lives of the creative hands that fashion it, thus highlighting our intention to let the artist speak through the medium of their accomplishments.
After 25 years of success, while the studio project was still at the center, expectable outgrowths emerged:
- We opened an experimental performance arena in 2008 that has hosted poetry, music, and theater of all genres
- We invited the regional artists in to create the conditions for full integration of our artists and added five additional showrooms in our 4000 square foot space to make platforms for both member artists and community artists to self-stage installations and happenings of all kinds
- We have begun to shape the Open Creative Education Center, an educational project inclusive to the income-sensitive and general public, and its development is ongoing
- We responded to the increasing need to conserve, collate, and present left to us through gifts, acquisition, and death expan as a result
In 2017, acting on an inevitable calling, an expanded mission emerged. Over the decades, founding member artists passed away, leaving their intellectual property, artworks, and writings to our care. The call for our stewardship was answered with the launch of the New England Visionary Artists Museum. Intentionally named an artist’s museum, it grew out of the spirit that art is only incidental to the lives of the creative hands that fashion it, thus placing our emphasis on the will of the artist to speak through the medium of their accomplishments. This is the spirit: art is incidental to the lives of the creative hands that fashion it, thus highlighting our intention to let the artist speak through the medium of their accomplishments.
The New England Visionary Artists Museum launched from the Anchor House of Artists in 2017 and was incorporated as a charitable 501(c)(3) in June 2023, with co-directorship by Michael Tillyer and Susan Foley. This is an outcome of a long walk of support to artists who live complicated lives with neurodiversity in a world more likely to judge them on their social differences than their unique contributions.
Our task now is build the grounds for the succession of this work so that these artworks and the stories behind them can be saved for future generations and to preserve the grounds for artists to work and present in affordable space and allow new works to emerge for the benfit of the whole community of the region of New England
Our task now is build the grounds for the succession of this work so that these artworks and the stories behind them can be saved for future generations and to preserve the grounds for artists to work and present in affordable space and allow new works to emerge for the benfit of the whole community of the region of New England
If you think this a place like this should exist, please take the opportunity to be a part of the growth of this new art platform and join us to support the diverse artistic gifts our neighborhoods need, our communities thrive & our New England region deserves.
Join us to support the diverse artistic gifts our neighborhoods need, our communities thrive on & our New England region deserves.
Let's imagine the world we want to live in.
- Subsidizing artists living with neurodiverse conditions
- Conserving and encouraging research of the regional self-taught and visionary artist
- Giving all New England artists the freedom to self-stage exhibitions
- Celebrating new music and performance, installation, and in-progress works, on a noncommercial platform
- Providing art education to income-sensitive citizens to resume in 2024
Let's imagine the world we want to live in.
Tax Information: 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization (EIN: 93-1824484).
All donations are tax-deductible where allowed by law. |
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The New England Visionary Artists Museum is here
Matching self-taught and professional artists to a showcase platform, Offering accessible and supportive studio life to the marginalized artist, Celebrating art on a human scale,
Feeding the diversity of cultural life, and Bringing all neighbors together to join the big dance Come see for yourselves
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❖ HAPPENINGS❖
in the GREGORY STONE REPOSITORY: ongoing
Gregory Stone (1947-2016) was a very talented painter and sculptor, much collected and selected for significant public sculpture and mural installations. He was a sought after teacher. His scenes of local cityscapes and natural regional beauty are much loved, as are his portraits of local people notable and anonymous.
Now the family is offering professionally-produced prints produced by Stephen Petegorsky Photographs in Florence Massachusetts. In this exhibit selected works and the "Tanglewood" print shown are available affordably to support the Gregory Stone family archive here. |
John Landino (1947-2022) SALE TO SUPPORT THE LANDINO ESTATE
We are hosting an ongoing sale to support the estate of an incredibly prolific and creative man. John Landino, a sculptor, a painter, a dadaist creative, died from surgical complications in February, 2022. He died impoverished. He was known in life for his incredible gusto. His desecrated books metal sculptures, books welded in and imprisoned by metal scraps, are available. His painting used a graphical slashing technique, gesturally marking pre-made artworks from known and unknown sources with scrapes of primary color. Several ready to go. A inveterate improvisational dadaist, he once brought a troop of artists to the Experimental Performance Arena to perform the Ursonate (aka Sonata in Primal Sounds), the mid-twentieth century absurdist opera by Kurt Schwitters. All works are incredibly, accessibly priced, and proceeds go to help his widow, the writer Laura Roberts.
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Now available from the NEW ENGLAND VISIONARY ARTISTS MUSEUM Gallery Store
Anchor House of Artists...
was founded in 1997 to subsidize the studio life of and represent work for artists living with neurodiverse conditions, to seek integration with the art establishment, to promote freedom of thought, to bring new art to public view.
and the New England Visionary Artists Museum launched out of the Anchor House of Artists in 2017 with the mission to archive, conserve, and educate about the work of artists who walked the difficult path of the visionary in their lives.
was founded in 1997 to subsidize the studio life of and represent work for artists living with neurodiverse conditions, to seek integration with the art establishment, to promote freedom of thought, to bring new art to public view.
and the New England Visionary Artists Museum launched out of the Anchor House of Artists in 2017 with the mission to archive, conserve, and educate about the work of artists who walked the difficult path of the visionary in their lives.
There may be a great fire in our soul,
yet no one ever comes to warm themselves at it, and passers-by see only a wisp of smoke. From Vincent van Gogh, letter 155, to Theo van Gogh |