Icons In Hand: Masterworks from Local Collections

January 9 – March 1, 2026

Opening Reception: Friday, January 9th, 5-8pm

Arnold Newman, Georgia O’Keeffe, Ghost Ranch, NM, 1946

Icons In Hand: Masterworks from Local Collections (Main Gallery, January–February 2026) brings museum-caliber black-and-white photographs by many of the greats right to Brattleboro. Drawn from a remarkable local collection, these prints invite you to get close—see the paper, the grain, the edge of the negative—and slow down with images that carry time and story across generations. It’s a chance to experience iconic photographs as objects, not just pictures on a screen: how they’re printed, toned, and cared for, and why those choices matter to what we see and feel.

Co-curated by Josh Farr and Mitch Weiss, the exhibition also opens a welcoming conversation about collecting: why people choose to live with photographs, how a print’s history and process shape its meaning, and how private stewardship can strengthen a community’s cultural life.  Icons In Hand is both a celebration of photography’s classics and a thank-you to the neighbors who safeguard them. Above all, it reflects VCP’s role as a place where artists, audiences, and prints meet—face to face, in the shared light of the gallery.

* More information coming soon *