Farnsworth Art Museum to Host Two-Day Symposium on the Life and Legacy of Betsy James Wyeth

A two-day program on October 22 and 23 brings together curators, scholars, artists, and cultural leaders in conjunction with the exhibition By Design: The Worlds of Betsy James Wyeth

Rockland, ME — October 2026 — The Farnsworth Art Museum will host a two-day symposium on Thursday, October 22, and Friday, October 23, exploring the creative vision and enduring legacy of Betsy James Wyeth. Presented in conjunction with the exhibition By Design: The Worlds of Betsy James Wyeth, the symposium brings together curators, scholars, artists, historians, and cultural leaders for conversations examining Wyeth’s work in environmental design, historic preservation and adaptive reuse, her creative partnership with her husband Andrew Wyeth, and her lasting impact on the arts and culture of Maine.

Thursday, October 22 Opening Keynote

The symposium opens on Thursday evening from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. with a social hour in the library featuring light refreshments, followed by a keynote lecture in the auditorium. The keynote presentation, titled The Making of Betsy Wyeth’s Island World, will be delivered by Philip Conkling, writer, naturalist, and co-founder of the Island Institute, and Peter Ralston, photographer and co-founder of the Island Institute. Ralston and Conkling will share their experience working closely with Betsy Wyeth at the start of her most ambitious project: the transformation of Allen Island, five miles off Port Clyde. Their firsthand accounts, accompanied by Ralston’s photographs from the period, illuminate the scale of this endeavor and the core principles of Betsy Wyeth’s environmental design work. Registration is required for the Thursday evening program.

Friday, October 23 All-Day Program

Friday’s full-day program runs from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and features four panel conversations. Registration begins at 10 a.m. and includes coffee, morning refreshments, and museum admission. Lunch is on your own, with self-guided gallery access available during the afternoon break.

Panel 1, Betsy James Wyeth and the Maine Historic Preservation Movement, brings Maine State Historian Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr. into conversation with William L. Coleman, Ph.D., Wyeth Study Center Director and Wyeth Foundation Curator. Shettleworth, who worked directly with Betsy Wyeth at the start of the Allen Island project, will discuss her commitment to vernacular architecture in the midcoast region and place her preservation efforts in broader context.

Panel 2, Creative Forces: Betsy James Wyeth in Context of Her Peers, features Thomas Denenberg, John Wilmerding Director of the Shelburne Museum, and Gail Levin, Distinguished Professor at the City University of New York, in conversation with Francesca Soriano, Ph.D., Curator of American Art at the Farnsworth. This panel explores Betsy Wyeth’s creative vision alongside those of two pioneering women who preceded her: Electra Havemeyer Webb and Josephine Nivison Hopper.

Panel 3, The Historical Imagination of Betsy James Wyeth, brings together Arthur Spiess, Chief Historic Preservationist for Prehistoric Archaeology at the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, and Margaret Creighton, Professor Emerita of Bates College, in conversation with William L. Coleman, Ph.D. Spiess will share his experience with the professional archaeology undertaken at Allen Island; Creighton will offer insights drawn from her scholarship on maritime labor in the Gulf of Maine.

Panel 4, Desire Paths: Contemporary Artists on Allen and Benner Islands, features artists Elaine K. Ng and Mandy Lamb in conversation with Kendall DeBoer, Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Colby College Museum of Art. Both artists created new work in residence on the islands shaped by Betsy Wyeth, and will discuss the experiences and layered histories that inspired those pieces.

By Design: The Worlds of Betsy James Wyeth is on view in the Farnsworth’s Wyeth Center through December 31. The exhibition explores Betsy James Wyeth’s expansive creative practice as a designer, preservationist, collector, collaborator, and steward of place. It is co-organized by the Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, Maine; the Brandywine Museum of Art, Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania; and the Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine; in association with the Wyeth Foundation for American Art.

Advance registration is required. Symposium registration includes museum admission and all Friday lectures; separate tickets are available for the Thursday evening keynote. To register, visit Farnsworth Art Museum.