Just outside the hamlet of Pine Plains, ChaNorth, the Hudson Valley residency arm of Chashama, is preparing for one of its most public weekends of the year. On July 19 and 20, the residency will open its doors for Upstate Art Weekend with “Alone, You Are Heard,” a curated sculpture exhibition featuring 21 artists working in materials ranging from textiles to steel, as well as performances, studio visits, and a Weird Music Night unlike anything else in Dutchess County.
“We’ve had artists lie in the river in orange jumpsuits to dam it up for a photo project,” said Anita Durst, co-founder of Chashama. “It’s that kind of place — wild, surprising, deeply creative.”
The sculpture exhibition, organized by PARADICE PALASE co-founder Kat Ryals and installed across ChaNorth’s wooded groves, open fields, and stone-ringed paths, explores the intersection of solitude and resonance. Works are embedded in rock, suspended from trees, and nestled between outbuildings. The show includes artists from both the ChaNorth and PARADICE PALASE networks — among them Lauren Carly Shaw, Cara Lynch, Jonathan Sims, and Brigitta Varadi, the residency’s longtime director.
Public hours during Upstate Art Weekend run from 12 to 6 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, with an artist-led tour on Sunday at 2 p.m. and a performance series on Saturday evening beginning at 6 p.m. known as Weird Music Night, featuring acts like Spyrodon, Skull Tower 4E, and A.I. Pacino.
Paint and brushes sit ready for use inside one of the ChaNorth studios. (Ava Battinelli/The New Pine Plains Herald)
Durst has long championed giving artists access to space in unconventional ways. Since founding Chashama in 1995, she has helped transform more than 100 temporarily vacant commercial properties across the city into free or low-cost artist studios, galleries, and performance venues.
In Pine Plains, she saw something different: not vacancy, but possibility. “If the space is empty, the energy is negative,” she said. “But once you put people in community there, it creates connection — with nature, with each other, with something larger than yourself.”
Durst credits Varadi with shaping the identity of ChaNorth over the past decade. “It’s not really the site — it’s the people,” Durst said. “Brigitta cooks the meals, brings up curators, leads tours. She has made it what it is.”
Varadi’s vision has helped establish ChaNorth as one of the most competitive rural residencies in the region. Each year, over 600 artists from across the globe apply for a chance to live and work at the property for four weeks. The residency accepts only 42, spread over six monthly cohorts between April and October. July’s cohort includes Zoe Davis, Christina Price Washington, Natalya Kornblum-Laudi, and Andy Marlowe.
For New York City-based artists, many of whom share cramped apartments or juggle multiple jobs, the appeal of Pine Plains lies in the quiet and the space. “People are hungry for creative outlets where they can experiment and make mistakes,” Durst said. “ChaNorth gives them that freedom.”
The program is not just about solitude — it’s about forging lasting networks. “It’s become a family,” Durst said. “Artists share opportunities, support each other’s work. Brigitta even organizes a show in the city once a year to showcase alumni.”
Former residents echo that sentiment. “I’ve done a number of residencies, but this one was something special,” said Abigail Lucien, a 2023 participant. “We cooked together, critiqued together, explored the trails. There was a stone wall behind the house where we’d go and just sit, watching the light change over the hills.”
A scenic view from the ChaNorth property offers artists a quiet place to reflect and create. (Ava Battinelli/The New Pine Plains Herald)
Another artist, Peter Fulop, described ChaNorth as “one of the few places where you feel completely held by the land and the people at the same time. You’re not just making art—you’re recharging your soul.”
Durst said she hopes to expand the model to other Hudson Valley towns. “We’re always looking for more space,” she said. “If someone has an old hardware store, a vacant building — we’ll fix it up, insure it, and turn it into a hub for artists. We have a formula that works.”