NEW ART IN AN HISTORIC SETTING

NEW ART IN AN HISTORIC SETTING

The Sainte Genevieve Art Guild will mount its first Garden Art Show at the historic Jean Baptiste Valle House May 16-17 during the town's Spring Garden Walk...a new art event staged in a structure that is more than two centuries old.

The art show and sale will be held on the front veranda of the house, overlooking its beautiful, distinctive gardens.

The Jean Baptiste Valle House was built in 1794 by Ste. Genevieve's last French colonial commandant. It was continuously occupied as a private residence for over 200 years, with ownership changing hands only four times in its history.

The Vion/Papin family----among the pioneer families of St. Louis----had one of the longest tenures, dating from the 1860s. Ownership stayed in the family through several generations and descendant Vion Papin Schram lived there from the 1960s until it was sold in 2003 to another private owner.

In 2013 the house was acquired by the The National Society of the Colonial Dames in America/Missouri, becoming part of the Bolduc Museum House Properties, which includes the famous Louis Bolduc House, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Those who visit the Guild art show also will have a unique opportunity to visit inside the house, where more art will be on display.

Other activities that will take place at Bolduc House properties that weekend include a re-enactment of the 1958 opening of the Louis Bolduc House as a museum property following a massive restoration project. Re-enactors will provide demonstrations of what life was like at the house in the 1700s.

Admission to the art show and sale is free; a fee will be charged for some other activities.

The Sainte Genevieve Art Guild is a non-profit group whose members come from East-Central and Southeast Missouri, including several who are members of the Cape Girardeau Visual Arts Cooperative. Many are award-winning artists, carrying on the tradition of the Ste. Genevieve Art Colony and Summer School of Art, which flourished in the town in the 1930s under the leadership of art world luminaries such as Thomas Hart Benton, Fred Conway and Joe Jones.