Cuttyhunk Plein Air
Cuttyhunk Plein Air is an annual one-day festival that takes place on Cuttyhunk (the last of the Elizabeth Islands in the town of Gosnold, MA) on a Saturday in late June.
2026 Festival Dates
Saturday, June 20
Rain Date: Sunday, June 21
The CPAF is limited to 60 artists, and the cost to participate is $115 per person. This fee covers registration, ferry travel with cargo transport via M/V Cuttyhunk Ferry, and a box lunch. The cost to Cuttyhunk residents, or those who do not need a day-of ferry ticket, is $55. On the day of the festival, artists will travel from State Pier 3 in New Bedford, where registration packets and ferry tickets are distributed (9am departure), to Cuttyhunk (10am arrival). There they will check in and collect their box lunches, and volunteer “island ambassadors” will greet painters and deliver them to various locations across the island. Artists will wrap up around 2:30pm to be ready for pickup (or can walk back), and they may submit paintings for jurying by 2:45pm. Artists will enjoy a brief “_ARTY!” reception after jurors have had a chance to select 1st, 2nd, 3rd place, and purchase prizes. Islanders and visitors may also purchase art directly from the artists. The “_ARTY!” is open to all and free to attend. Finally, artists will depart on the Cuttyhunk Ferry at 4:00pm to return to New Bedford. (This is an approximate schedule, as ferry departure time is subject to change.)
This event is SOLD OUT.
Email info@marionartcenter.org to be added to the waitlist.
Cost per artist: $115
Cost for Island residents/No ferry ticket needed: $55
Due to limited capacity, registration fees are nonrefundable. If your circumstances change and you are unable to attend, you may send another artist in your place. The MAC will make every effort to fill spots from the wait list, but we cannot guarantee a refund.
The Cuttyhunk Plein Air Festival is supported by grant funding from the Gosnold Cultural Council, a local chapter of the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency.
Cuttyhunk Plein Air 2026
Approximate Schedule
Saturday, June 20
Rain Date: Sunday, June 21
8:20am: Arrive at Cuttyhunk Ferry,* (State Pier, New Bedford, MA); Collect registration packet and ticket from event volunteer; supplies will be stowed for travel
9:00am: Depart New Bedford aboard M/V Cuttyhunk Ferry
10:00am: Arrive at Cuttyhunk; Check-in and collect box lunch; Island Ambassadors bring painters to various locations
2:15pm: Wrap up and head back to dock
2:30pm: Deadline for submitting paintings for jurying; Celebrate with other painters at the "_ARTY!"
3:45pm: Board the ferry to return to New Bedford
5:00pm: Arrive back at State Pier, New Bedford
*Additional details about the location of the Cuttyhunk Ferry will be provided when we approach the event date. Please note the ferry is currently operating out of the Northeast side of the State Pier.
2025 Sponsors
As in previous years, we appreciate Jim and Molly Conway’s donation of the Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Prize Awards. We thank Robert LeComte, Jr., Owner/CEO of Riverside Art, Ltd., 1600 G.A.R. Hwy, Swansea, MA, who generously donated the $200 first place, $100 second place, and $50 third place prizes. We are grateful for their support of the arts community. Thank you also to Barry's Fine Wine & Spirits for donating wine, and to Sid Wainer/Chef's Warehouse for providing bites and snacks for the "_ARTY!" celebration.
We are grateful for the ongoing support of the Island community. Special thanks to the many island ambassadors and volunteers who make this event possible.
2025 Jurors
Jay Ryan is a watercolor painter who’s been observing places, people, and things around Massachusetts’ Southcoast for more than twenty years. He works from his Wilbur Point studio in Fairhaven. After spending thirty-four years as a public school art teacher, then elementary school principal, he returned to daily practice as a painter. Since 2012 Ryan has been teaching painting for the Marion Art Center and Westport Art Group; he taught as a teen mentor for the New Bedford Art Museum, and online for the Penn Studio School in Philadelphia. Until Covid shutdowns in 2020, he had been a volunteer gallery instructor at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, leading weekly K-12 school group tours. His work has been exhibited at the New Bedford Art Museum in Member Shows and multiple Teen Artist Intern Program exhibits, Westport Art Group, Provincetown Art Museum, and Judith Klein Gallery, New Bedford, with solo exhibits at the Marion Art Center (2015) and Maiato-Fitzgerald Gallery (2021), New Bedford. In summer, Ryan is a part of the annual Art Drive in Dartmouth and Westport and has displayed his work at Art in the Park in Marion. In September of 2019 he was selected as a member of that year’s Cuttyhunk Island Artists’ Residency. Ryan is a graduate of Framingham State University, Lesley University and has studied at the Massachusetts College of Art, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and Danforth Museum.
Michael Walden, artist, takes his viewers on an exploration of surface and visual narrative. The journey he creates, with figures and interior spaces, brings us into the very essence of artistic expression. He challenges viewers to move beyond the need to understand a painting and asks, instead, that they look for their own personal connections and significance. A year in Europe, as a child, captured Walden’s interest in art and led him, during college, to study painting in Florence, Italy. A natural teacher, Walden earned an MFA in Art Education, in 1996, from Boston University. Following this, he became an artist/teacher at an inner city arts magnet school.
After many years of teaching, Walden returned to graduate school. In 2014, he received a MFA in painting from Massachusetts College of Art. He has been a two-time recipient of the Returning Residency Program at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA (2016-17). In 2017, he had his first solo exhibition at the Leslie Lohman Museum, in New York City. In 2018, 2019 and 2023, he was awarded artist residencies at the Vermont Studio Center and on Cuttyhunk Island. In 2020, he was the Visual Arts Fellow at the Independence Art Studios in Houston TX. Walden has shown his work in New York, Boston, Houston, and California. Internationally, he was an invited guest artist at the Nepali-an Art exhibition, Virtually Nude. His work was presented in a solo exhibition at the Mini Modern, in 2020. Walden is currently represented by Prince Street Gallery, in Manhattan. Learn more at https://www.michaelwalden.net.
Pamela Hoss earned her BFA in painting from Southeastern Massachusetts University in 1972 and her MFA in painting from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University in 1984. Pamela moved to New Bedford in 2007 with her husband Scott Currier, a cabinet maker/furniture maker. They bought a house in New Bedford in 2011 where she currently maintains her studio. Hoss taught figure drawing and portrait drawing/painting in the Fine Arts Department at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth for thirty years and retired in 2018. Pamela has received a National Endowment for the Arts, Regional Visual Artist’s Fellowship from the New England Foundation for the Arts in Drawing. She has several pieces in the Drawing Collection at the Boston Public Library. Hoss has exhibited nationally and regionally in commercial galleries, university galleries and museums. Selected exhibitions include the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, the Art Complex Museum in Duxbury, the Fitchburg Museum, the Danforth Museum in Framingham, the Fuller Craft Museum in Brockton, the Attleboro Museum, and the New Bedford Art Museum/ArtWorks!.
Cuttyhunk Plein Air 2025
1st Place Award - Monica Hurley, First Day of Summer
2nd Place Award - Tom Ardito, Erosion of Morning
3rd Place Award - Joan Bartram, Waiting
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Meg Arpin, Church Beach
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Lucy Iannotti, Cuttyhunk Harbor
2025 Event Coordinators & Volunteers
Event Coordinator: Michelle Carvalho
MAC Staff: Jodi Stevens, Heather Corrigan
Event Volunteers: Teri Bordenave, Ellie Von Wellsheim, Sara Ellis Lehner, Paul Lehner, Jennifer Webb, Charley Thompson, Donna Dore, Paula Dimare, Beverly Snow, Leslie Gray, Dawn Vogt, Ann Conway, Rachel Garfield, Deb Carney, and many, many more!
Cuttyhunk Plein Air 2024
1st Place Award - Kathleen Tirrell, The Compound
2nd Place Award - Karen Ryder, Will on the Rocks
3rd Place Award - Jessica Morse, Between Two Ponds
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Mandy Fraser, The Cove
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Lucy Iannotti, Foggy Morning
2024 Event Coordinators
Marne Goodrich joins the long time CPAF team of on-island coordinators (Teri Bordenave, Ellie von Wellsheim, Sara and Paul Lehner, and many more). Goodrich has over 25 years of management experience in the visual arts. As Gallery Manager for the Virginia Lynch Gallery in Tiverton, RI, she oversaw numerous exhibitions including Dale Chihuly glassworks, Howard Ben Tre sculpture, and Wolf Kahn pastels. Previous positions include Art Director for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in Boston (commissioning large collections of paintings, photography and illustration for book publishing) and Production Manager at Little, Brown and Company.
Goodrich was responsible for creating and hosting exhibitions at Westport Rivers Vineyard and Newport Vineyards, as well as the “Evenings with Artists” series for the Westport Land Conservation Trust in Westport, MA. She collaborated on “Art on the Farm,” an annual community art show and sale at artist’s studios, the Sandywoods Artist Cooperative in Tiverton, RI, and the Atrium Gallery in Providence. Interested in art education as well as exhibition, Goodrich invited Faith Ringgold to speak and show her story quilts at Friends Academy in Dartmouth. Recently, Goodrich helped host Brown University Bookstore’s acclaimed author series of lectures and book signings in Providence.
A long-time Cuttyhunk summer resident and graduate of Colgate University, Marne Goodrich lives in Little Compton, RI with her husband, Peter, and her daughter, Laney.
Cuttyhunk Plein Air 2023
1st Place Award - Martha Keating
2nd Place Award - Fidel Castro Sincu
3rd Place Award - Toni Dumville
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Roxanne Blackmore
Spirit of Cuttyhunk Purchase Award - Heather Long-Roise
Event Images
