- [Narrator] Coming up next, we'll visit one of the region's newest art museums, explore a wide ranging American Impressionist collection, and meet the couple whose personal paintings are now on display for everyone to see.

Then later, we'll visit a place where one man's model railroad collection has evolved into a small museum.

This is "Treasures Inside The Museum".

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music) One of Southern New England's newest museums is also one of its most talked about.

The Westerly Museum of American Impressionism features a collection of works that make these galleries a unique destination.

- To our knowledge, this is the only museum that focuses solely on American Impressionism.

There's certainly other museums that show American Impressionism, but we're very unique in that aspect, that that is our sole focus as a museum.

- If you look at American art, they have the Hudson River School, which is a very famous school of paintings in New York, which ends about 1860, roughly, 1870.

And then you have American Impressionists, roughly 1880 to 1920.

And then you have the Ashcan School, more contemporary schools.

American Impressionists, that period in American art is often sort of bypassed.

- I think the permanent collection probably tells a story of American Impressionism, which is very educational and sort of will probably stay, 'cause you need to tell that story.

We have our large gallery, but there's four smaller galleries that would be able to change so that we can show, you know, other American Impressionist artists, other themes, so we are very excited that, you know, that will happen.

- [Narrator] This museum is the brainchild of Cynthia and Thomas Sculco, a local family that has decided to share their love of art and their personal collection with the community they grew up in.

- [Thomas] Cynthia and I have been collecting American Impressionistic art for probably 40 years.

And during that period of time, we accumulated a great number of paintings.

- [Cynthia] I don't think we ever set out to talk about, "Gee, we should have a museum."

- And being Westerly natives, we thought it would be a wonderful opportunity to share these great paintings with the community that we love so much.

- And we thought, "Well, how can we do that?"

And we looked at a couple of different possibilities.

- This space became available, and it was, we thought, perfect for a museum.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) The beauty of it, the museum, is that it has a narrative.

And so as you go through the galleries, particularly in the permanent wing, there's a story that it tells about American Impressionism and the different art colonies where many of these artists studied, worked, and met other artists.

The natural beauty of these paintings, and not only the great artists, but those right underneath them, who have less notoriety and reputation, they're amazing artists, and one of the things we want to do with the museum is showcase that group of artists who are unique, do unbelievably beautiful work, and I think need to be appreciated, and for some reason, not as appreciated as I think they should.

- [Narrator] American Impressionism is characterized by thick brush strokes and vivid colors, often with an emphasis on distinctly American landscapes.

This style of painting emerged from an art movement that originated in France.

- Most American Impressionists went to Europe to study.

Both of these artists went to France, and both of 'em worked with a very famous Impressionist, Claude Monet.

And Monet was great, because he took them on and taught them, and, you know, they were advocates for Impressionism, which was not highly respected, both in Europe, and subsequently in the United States, until later.

And you can see Claude Monet was famous for his Haystacks as well as his Water Lilies, and you can see this is an artist, Theodore Butler, you can see the haystacks and the beautiful color in that painting.

And if you look here, this is another artist.

This is John Leslie Breck.

Also studied with Monet.

And you can see the haystack shape in this painting as well.

Both of 'em go on and become outstanding American Impressionist artists.

What draws 'em is the color, and this is unique for American Impressionistic art, is both of them throw out a tremendous amount of light and color.

The paintings before that, Hudson River School, more static.

The colors were a little darker.

They don't jump off the canvas.

But in this painting, there are blues and pinks and reds.

Same thing here.

This underbrush and tree, it's almost climbing off the canvas.

And then of course, there's this beautiful seaside river view behind it.

What's really interesting about these two artists is they both went to Giverny to work with Monet, and they both fell in love with Monet's stepdaughter.

And Monet, in the end, had to make a decision, which artist was going to get his stepdaughter.

And Butler was from a very wealthy American family, and so he chose Theodore Butler.

So his daughter marries Theodore Butler, and unfortunately, and Butler stays in France, nine years later, she dies.

He comes back to America, continues to paint, goes back to Giverny, and falls in love with her sister.

And then he marries her sister.

So, Theodore Butler has the amazing distinction of marrying two of Claude Monet's daughters.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] The galleries here have been carefully curated and are arranged by artist, style, and subject matter.

There are a significant number of seascapes and harbors in the collection, along with several works from the so-called Cape Ann artist colonies.

Generations of celebrated artists have painted scenes on the north shore of Massachusetts, including the fishing industry and the iconic Motif Number 1 in Rockport.

(gentle music continues) Nearby Gloucester Harbor was also a popular subject for artists in this area.

This one is titled "Dancing Water".

- This is an example of a painting of Gloucester Harbor by Jane Peterson, who is a well-known female American Impressionist, which was rare at that time.

And she is depicting a harbor where she moved to after she came back from Europe and her travels abroad.

I think the colors, the blues, the greens, the mixture of colors, it really shows you the depth of her talent, of course, but also, it sort of lets you feel the water when you're looking at a harbor, and how it changes, and how you have different colors all the time.

So yes, I really like her play with the different color blues, reflection of some pink.

You almost feel like the the sun is coming from a certain direction and reflecting in the water itself.

And that's why I think it makes it extremely special.

- Most of the art colonies extended up the New England coast.

Rockport, Massachusetts, Ogunquit, Maine, Cape Ann, Boston, those are all the main schools as you go up the coast.

The Old Lyme school is really unique in that all their artists are Connecticut artists, and they have a great collection.

This is a painting by Childe Hassam, who is probably regarded as most known American Impressionist.

And Hassam is very interesting artist.

Again, went to France to study, and came back in the early 1900s and went to Old Lyme, Connecticut.

And Florence Griswold, where the Florence Griswold Museum is, donated her house to artists, and they would live there, paint there on the Lieutenant River, and Hassam became the leading contemporary artist of that Old Lyme colony.

So this painting is a painting of actually the Connecticut River.

And what I like about it, when you look at it, you can see the flow of the water.

I mean, there's a lot of life in the water, and there are a number of different boats which appear almost as a blur.

And then there's a sailboat here you can see more in definition.

And then as you look beyond it, the use of green.

Most American Impressionists use not so much green, blues, and blue particularly was a big color for them.

But he uses all kinds of different shades of green and gives you the depth of the painting.

And then you see the trees in the background.

And there's the sky.

And American Impressionists are known for their skies.

So there's the blue sky, there's the big, fluffy clouds in the sky, and just sort of showcases that painting.

(gentle music continues) - [Narrator] Another gallery chronicles the work of Walter Griffin, who had his own unique style of painting.

The pieces in this gallery cover 40 years, so you can walk through and see how his style evolved across the span of his career.

- Walter Griffin was born in Maine, and he had more of a traditional upbringing with his schooling and his teaching of how to paint.

We have examples in the gallery of two of his earliest paintings.

One is a portrait of a woman in Brittany, and another is a more traditional landscape painting of the artist Millais' house in France, actually.

But travel was so important to his artistic career and his transformation as an artist.

He traveled to France and Italy.

He was inspired by the French Impressionists.

But he never quite followed in their footsteps completely.

He went off on his own path as an artist.

When you look at this painting here, this is a scene from Venice, Italy, and you could see when he embraced the Impressionist idea of painting outside, capturing a scene, but he really went on his own path with his painting technique.

He would oftentimes use a pallet knife and get this incredibly thick impasto on the canvas.

So if you come up and look closely at the painting, the paint is layered on so thickly that, I mean, it's just, it's almost sculptural in a way.

It becomes 3D.

- [Narrator] Every painting here has a story, a story about how it came into the collection, and a story about the artist and their place among the most celebrated and influential American Impressionists.

- This is a painting by Gifford Beal.

It's a beautiful American Impressionism painting.

He studied with William Merritt Chase when he was 12, and so he was a prodigy.

You look at it and you see the beauty of the trees.

It almost, they just sort of speak to you.

You feel relaxed when you look at them, that you wanna be at that picnic, you know?

Like that would be a beautiful place to be on that particular day.

You sort of see what we talked about before, the landscape, it just all fits together.

(gentle music) You can see his works at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Fine Arts Museum in Chicago, and the Smithsonian in Washington, but also here in the Westerly Museum of American Impressionism.

So we're so excited that we have this painting here in our museum to share with everyone who comes.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) - [Narrator] Walking through the galleries here is a trip through the different interpretations of American Impressionism.

It's a study in light, color, and style.

(gentle music continues) - This painting is by Fern Coppedge, who was this fabulous artist in the early 1900s, but she's very under-recognized.

You know, we've talked about Childe Hassam, Theodore Butler, some of these big names in American Impressionism, but there's a lot of artists that you'll see in the museum that are less known, but we believe deserve greater recognition.

(gentle music continues) She was part of this group called the Philadelphia 10.

This was an all-female group of artists.

They would support each other, they would form exhibitions together, and, you know, highlight each other's works.

And this was very important in the early 1900s when the art world was kind of male centric, and women didn't have the same access to schooling like men did.

They didn't have the same access to freedom of travel around the world like men did.

So this was a really important group of all female artists championing each other and supporting each other at the time.

This painting is a winter scene, so it's, you know, the darker time of year.

However, she pulls in this incredibly vibrant color throughout the scene.

When you think of winter and snow, you think of white and darker evenings.

But she would go out, she would trudge into the, you know, out in the snow.

She was very known for wearing this heavy bear skin coat.

She would trudge out into the snow and find a scene that she'd wanna paint, and she would actually strap her canvas to a tree to keep it from blowing around in the wind, and she would paint her canvas that way.

So she was committed to her art form.

If you look closely at the white snow, you'll see that she incorporates all these different colors, blues, pinks, purples.

So it's just full of color.

And then the path itself has yellows, blues.

The houses back here, vibrant greens and yellows.

So she really had, she was known for these snowscapes of these small towns.

One of the most interesting aspects of Impressionism is that artists weren't taking photographs and taking the photo back to their studio and spending months and months painting.

Instead, they were going out into nature, taking their canvas, taking their easel, trudging out into nature, and painting directly from the scenes of what they were seeing in front of them.

So they were interested in capturing the environment, the atmosphere, the lighting, and really capturing those transient moments that maybe are there for one minute and gone the next.

So they're going outside, painting very quickly.

You get these heavy, quick brush strokes.

You can see the brush strokes.

And if you zoom in really close, it actually becomes an abstract painting, 'cause detail is not the interest here.

The interest is capturing the color, the atmosphere, and really just the light, the glistening light.

Usually, the Impressionists would paint in one sitting, so they're capturing that moment, and that is the painting.

It's not always the case, sometimes they'd come back to it, but usually, the finished painting is when they're done painting for the day.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) - Well, I think museums matter.

I think they elevate the, I would say, the environment, the art.

- We're hoping it does more than just show the paintings, but it becomes a resource both in research and education for this art genre.

- Everyone will have their own treasures, and I think that that's what makes it special.

I think everyone, whether we have some florals or we have some portraits, other than seascapes and landscapes and harborscapes, I think people just come back and sort of say, "I wanna sit and just think about this painting, or look at this painting."

And that's what we hope for, that they really will find a place to relax, a place to contemplate, see beautiful paintings, and I think we need that in our lives.

(gentle music continues) (upbeat music) (gentle music) - [Narrator] When Ray Cox took an early retirement from his job working on submarines, he figured it was time to do something new, perhaps something in the small barn behind his house.

- I had trains when I was a kid.

Always liked them.

I liked to be able to hook 'em up together and just play with 'em.

But they only came out at Christmas time, around the tree.

And I've had a love for it.

And then when I retired, I says, "I'm gonna start collecting these."

- [Narrator] And collect them he did.

- Well, I had Marx trains and I also had a Lionel.

I never liked the Lionel.

Everybody else collects Lionel.

Very few Marx collectors.

I said, "I'll be able to find this stuff."

- [Narrator] It didn't take long before the trains started piling up in Ray's house and he needed to find another place to keep all of them.

- So I had the barn here, you know, for my truck and car, and I just turned it over into a museum.

(laughs) - [Narrator] Ray's passion for the trains in this small museum is immeasurable, just like the number in his collection.

- You really couldn't count 'em.

It's probably in the thousands.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) - [Narrator] The Louis Marx Toy Company made toy trains from the 1930s through the '70s.

- I got the first engine that Louis Marx made.

- [Narrator] Originally, they were made from tin, but when World War II came along, metal became too much of a precious commodity, and many of those early trains were sold for scrap.

As a result, the earliest trains have become quite rare, making this collection all the more remarkable.

- [Ray] Ones like that Popeye one over here, that's a treasure, having the one with Popeye and Olive Oyl.

- [Narrator] Another treasure is this highly collectible bunny train that was made for Easter.

- 1936.

They only made it one year.

That's a tough one to find.

And the odd thing about it is that the rabbit came in two ways, one with blue eyes, one with the pink eyes.

One for the girls, one for the boys.

(laughs) It's the way it was.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) - [Narrator] Perhaps the most rare of all the pieces in Ray's collection is this tank.

Rare because it was never manufactured.

- This one here is a prototype, and it goes on a flatcar.

It's a little windup.

And underneath, it says, "Erie, 1941."

It's right there.

But they didn't produce it.

This is the only one.

One of a kind on this one here.

They have tanks, but not with the gun on top like that one has.

Little tank, Army tank.

I think it probably still works.

(toy whirring) It's amazing.

Back there, the springs in 'em.

Today, you get a windup toy and it's broke the next day.

They made some good stuff back in the day.

That's one of my favorites.

He didn't reproduce it.

That was it.

Just the one of a kind.

It just didn't go over big, I guess.

Yeah, no one else has it.

I got it.

(laughs) - [Narrator] In the late 1940s, the Marx Company switched over their manufacturing to plastic.

The walls here are literally filled with thousands of different examples.

Even train cars with the slightest variations are included.

Ray takes a lot of pride in the collection.

Enthusiasts and collectors alike enjoy browsing and admiring the displays.

But for another group of visitors, it's what's on the second floor that gets them excited.

- 'Cause they don't wanna just see trains on a wall, they wanna see 'em running, and here it is right here.

(upbeat music) (trains whirring) (upbeat music continues) Old, young, they fall in love with it.

(upbeat music continues) All the buildings, all Louis Marx.

This is the Honeymoon House, they call it, right here.

These little signs here, they're refrigerator magnets.

I added as I went on, you know?

I did different things.

I got a farm in here.

You know, you got the Army base down the other end.

I said, "I don't know how I'm going to get it all in here," but I did it, you know?

And I got a little town, a little city here, and it's all scratch built.

Everything is, you know, shingles from my roads, and all the scenery, a lot of the rocks, trees, all came out right out of my own property.

If you want, I can show you one of the firehouses right here.

This is from the '20s.

There's a spring in there, see?

You turn it one time, right?

And you put the alarm on, and they shoot out.

Imagine that.

And it still works.

- [Narrator] Museums are often recognized for the collections they hold, but in this small space, it's equally a tribute to the man who put it all together.

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