This summer I am excited to be participating in the Hudson River Fellowship Program.  Accepted artists receive free tuition and board to spend the month of July painting from nature in the Catskills.  Following the tradition of the Hudson River School painters the program seeks to "bring together the reawakening enthusiasm for the old American painters, the vigorous but unfocused scene of contemporary landscape painting and the urgent need for a renewed reverence for the land. By bringing back the skills and spirit of the pre-impressionist landscape painters the program will give much needed direction to a new generation of painters. As they learn to carefully study and reflect on the trees and clouds and blades of grass and cliffs, their paintings will become beautiful. Ideally, these artists and their beautiful representations of nature will help to lead the culture back to a stronger connection to the landscape. The fellowship seeks to make a contribution both to the art world and the conservation movement."