Newly Opened David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center
While we love taking day trips to Manhattan to see plays, visit museums, and enjoy performances, it’s nice that there are more artistic hubs opening up and supporting artists right in our backyard. Take the newly opened David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center.
Recently opened on October 1st, this vibrant public venue is the hub for programming for the community, artists, and families. This includes a roster of free and low-cost events. This includes a focus on feature local and global performances and exhibits, residencies for visual, performing, and literary artists, and space for community cultural functions.
Located inside The Pocantico Center in Tarrytown (on the former Rockefeller family estate), the location is housed in John D. Rockefeller’s historic 1908 Orangerie, which has been completely transformed by architects to include a performance space, gallery, and artists’ studio.
Starting on October 1st, The Pocantico Center invites the community to the inaugural exhibition at the DR Center gallery, Inspired Encounters: Women Artists and the Legacies of Modern Art. The collection is made up of 43 artworks, pairing pieces by a dozen groundbreaking women artists of the postwar period with new commissions of contemporary art. It will be on view from now until March 19, 2023. All visitors must reserve a free timed-entry ticket prior to visiting, which is available online.
Highlights what families can check out this fall/winter at the David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center:
- October 15th: Visit the David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center during their Community Open House. This offers visitors a first glimpse of the space to explore its sustainability features such as the solar array and rain garden, meet inaugural Pocantico Prize-winning visual artist Athena LaTocha, and view the inaugural exhibition, Inspired Encounters. At 2:30pm, local musician and composer Pablo Mayor and company will animate the performance space with a sneak peek open rehearsal of Untold Tales (premiering on November 16th at the DR Center), followed by an audience Q&A. Guests are welcome to join for any portion of this three-hour event. The event is free but you have to register in advance.
- November 5th-6th: Visit during an open studio with inaugural Pocantico Prize winner and DR Center visual artist in residence Athena LaTocha. The event is free.
- November 4 & 10 from 2:00pm-3:00pm: See a work-in-process featuring collaborations between artists from the Asian Cultural Council and Composers Now. Tickets are $15 per person.
- November 16th from a lot 6:30pm-8:30pm: See Pablo Mayor’s musical, Untold Tales inspired by the stories of local immigrant communities woven together with local author Washington Irving’s Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Tickets are $15 per person
- December 1st from 6:30pm-8:30pm: See a performance by the renowned dance group A.I.M by Kyle Abraham. The performance will entwine a sensual and provocative vocabulary with a strong emphasis on music, text, video, and visual art. Tickets are $15 per person.
Additionally, the new arts center will be a “net-zero” building with the goal of achieving platinum LEED certification. A nearby solar panel array will produce more energy than the building consumes. A rain garden will conserve water and reduce runoff pollutants. With these features, the David Rockefeller Center will also serve as an educational model of low-carbon development for students and other visitors.
David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center Details
200 Lake Road
Tarrytown, NY 10591
Check out the complete calendar of fall events at Pocantico at rbf.org/events. All visitors have to reserve tickets in advance.
