FRANCES McDORMAND AND SUZANNE BOCANEGRA CURATE CRADLED FOR SHAKER MUSEUM

The New Exhibition Explores the Transcendent Impact of the Shakers’ Communal Embrace from Cradle to Grave through Objects, Values, and Inspired Artistic Expression

Exhibition Open to the Public Sunday, September 15, through Sunday, December 1, at the Kinderhook Knitting Mill

Collaboration Includes an Evening Performance of Suzanne Bocanegra’s Farmhouse/Whorehouse featuring Lili Taylor on October 6

CHATHAM, N.Y., Sept. 9, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Artists Frances McDormand and Suzanne Bocanegra have joined forces with Shaker Museum to present Cradled, a thought-provoking exhibition that explores the transcendent impact of the Shakers’ communal embrace from cradle to grave through objects, values, and inspired modern-day artistic expression. The new exhibition will open to the public on Sunday, September 15, with a reception from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM at the Kinderhook Knitting Mill in Kinderhook, NY.

With Cradled, Frances McDormand and Suzanne Bocanegra have curated an experiential exhibition that illuminates the core Shaker values of compassionate care and support provided to all members of their community at all stages of their lives. Shakers built adult-size cradles to provide the nurturing care and respect at the end of life as well as the beginning. This exhibition showcases the craftsmanship of both adult and child-sized Shaker cradles and re-creates the environment in which they were used. Through the curation of objects, soundscapes, lighting, ephemera, and experience, Cradled invites visitors to feel the communal embrace and take part in the literal and figurative mending and communal care that were central to Shaker values.

Artists’ statement from Frances McDormand and Suzanne Bocanegra:
“To be cradled, held, supported by one’s community.
From birth to grave.
WITH RESPECT AND CARE.
To be mended by an exchange of trust, loyalty and compassion.
To be honored for one’s contribution to the whole and to believe one is contributing to the sustenance of the future.
The contemplation of these thoughts and possibilities is what we hope to offer you in this space.
TAKE YOUR TIME.
ROCK YOURSELF.
MEND, IF YOU LIKE.
YOU ARE WELCOME.”

Cradled features multiple Shaker cradles, both child and adult-size, along with a modern reproduction of an adult cradle. The exhibition includes cradles on loan from South Union Shaker Village, Canterbury Shaker Village, Hancock Shaker Village and John Keith Russell Antiques. Each cradle will have its own tableau, featuring a modern reproduction of a Shaker rocker, a basket of mending supplies and items in need of mending, and floor lamps generously loaned by Hammertown. Visitors are invited to sit and select something to mend or bring their own mending projects to work on. Cradled will also feature an original composition by David Lang, titled “last lullaby,” which will be a melodic component of a soundscape created and produced by Paul Umstron and Skip Lievsay.

Shaker Museum Interim Executive Director Lisa Malone Jackson commented: “Shaker Museum is thrilled to partner with Frances McDormand and Suzanne Bocanegra to present the deeply compelling material you see in the Cradled exhibition. With their thoughtful choices of objects that highlight the Shakers’ values, Frances and Suzanne enable our visitors to enter a world in which each individual is treated with the compassion that all people deserve. We hope that this exhibition will encourage visitors to examine what it means to live in community as well as our shared responsibilities to one another as human beings.” 

The exhibition will be open to the public Sunday, September 15, through Sunday, December 1. Exhibition hours are Friday and Saturday: 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM; Sunday: 11:00 AM – 4:00 PM. No tickets or advance reservations are required. For more information on the exhibition, visit shakermuseum.us. For more information on the Kinderhook Knitting Mill (located at 8 Hudson Street, 2nd Floor in Kinderhook, NY) visit: www.kinderhookknittingmill.com.

As part of the Cradled collaboration, Shaker Museum, Suzanne Bocanegra and Lili Taylor will also present an afternoon performance of Suzanne’s “artist’s lecture” Farmhouse/Whorehouse, a timeless piece that has been rewritten to incorporate observations on utopian communities including the Shakers. The performance is scheduled for Sunday, October 6, at 7:30 PM at the Crandell Theatre, 48 Main St., Chatham, NY. Tickets are available on Eventbrite.

Shaker Museum’s programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Shaker Museum purchased a 19th-century industrial building in Chatham, NY and is in the process of renovating and building an expansive addition to the facility designed by Selldorf Architects. The physical building will embody Shaker values of inclusion, innovation, and equality to create a museum that both tells the Shaker story and is responsive to the needs of the community in Chatham, Columbia County, and the surrounding Hudson Valley. The museum will also retain and maintain the historic Shaker site in Mount Lebanon. The new campus located at 5 Austerlitz Street will provide ample space for exhibitions and respond to the need for inclusive community gathering spaces through its exhibitions and robust programming.

About Shaker Museum
With more than 18,000 objects, Shaker Museum stewards the most comprehensive collection of Shaker material culture and archives. It is the leader nationwide among organizations devoted to Shaker history. Its permanent new facility in Chatham, NY, which is in development, was designed by Selldorf Architects. The museum also stewards the historic site in New Lebanon, NY, and will soon be moving its administrative offices, library, and archives to 29 Jones Ave. in Chatham. The museum’s collection can be viewed online at shakermuseum.us. 

Photos Link:
Exhibition poster here.

Portrait of Suzanne Bocanegra and Frances McDormand here.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Shaker Museum

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SOURCE Shaker Museum