New London Maritime Society Presents: Scenes From Neptune Park Today

New London Maritime Society Hosts a Weekend of Special Events Reception - Painter Ruth Sussler: Scenes from Neptune Park Donation-only Day at Pequot Light & Connecticut Freedom Trail Open House with historian Sally Ryan.

The New London Maritime Society - Custom House Maritime Museum presents a weekend of special events this weekend, September 28 & 29, 2013:

~ A Reception for artist Ruth Sussler and her exhibition Scenes from Neptune Park takes place on Saturday, September 28, from 4 to 6 PM at the Custom House Maritime Museum, 150 Bank Street, New London, CT. A long-time New London resident, Ruth Sussler's luminous oil paintings of local maritime scenes remains on view at the Custom House only through September 29, 2013. The event is free and open to the public. (See Ruth's artist statement, below.)

[Donation-only day at the lighthouse.] ~ Sunday, September 29 is the much-anticipated 2nd free (donation-only) day to tour Pequot (New London Harbor) Lighthouse. Although there is no charge, reservations must be made in advance by calling 860-447-2501. Only six people are permitted up the 119 steps to the lighthouse lantern at one time, due to limited space within 212-year-old historic structure. Children age seven and above must be able to climb on their own (not carried) to take part.

A proclamation, issued by Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy, designated Summer 2013 as the Summer of New London Harbor Light. The proclamation also launched NLMS's initiative: Be Part of Something BIG, a fundraising campaign to restore Harbor Light (also known as Pequot Light). Although the September 29 event marks the end of the Summer of New London Harbor Light, the campaign to Be Part of Something BIG continues into the fall, as we seek to raise sufficient funds to restore the lighthouse.

~ September is Connecticut Freedom Trail Month. New London Maritime Society celebrates the occasion with an Open House on Sunday, September 29, at the Custom House Maritime Museum. In addition to free admission for the day, the museum will play the PBS video series The Abolitionists throughout the afternoon. At 4pm, New London City historian Sally Ryan will speak at the Museum about New London's involvement in the slave trade. The Custom House Maritime Museum has the only permanent exhibition in the country devoted to the Amistad story. Admission is free and open to the public on Sunday to the museum and to Sally Ryan's talk .

It is the mission of the New London Maritime Society to protect and preserve New London's maritime heritage. And so we do. We are committed to telling the stories of New London's waterfront and to preserving our important heritage sites for future generations.

Fifty years living in New London, on the shores of the Thames River looking up river & out to sea from my house,

I embrace the stories and vistas of this my chosen locale.
This group of paintings, done over the past five decades express some of my responses to the fascination of life in this city and its history, especially centered around its connection to the sea.

My art background began as a small child in my father's commercial art

studio, then to studies with Josef Albers, and as studio art major at

Bennington College, later, freelancing department store window display

production, portraiture and landscape commissions.

Since living in New London, I have taught art workshops with the Eugene

O'Neill Creative Arts Program in local schools, been a docent at Lyman

Allyn Art Museum for 20 years and 50 years' active artist member, exhibitor

and many times prize winner at the Mystic Art Center.

-- Ruth Sussler, 9/2/13

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