“Andrew Wyeth at Kuerner Farm: The Eye of the Earth” to open at Reynolda House February 15, 2025
Andrew Wyeth at Kuerner Farm: The Eye of the Earth will open in the Mary and Charlie Babcock Wing Gallery at Reynolda House Museum of American Art Saturday February 15, 2025, and will be on view through May 25, 2025.
One of the most popular and celebrated American artists of the 20th century, Andrew Wyeth spent seven decades painting a particular farm in his hometown of Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, resulting in nearly 1,000 paintings. Andrew Wyeth at Kuerner Farm: The Eye of the Earth is the first focused exhibition on this defining subject and tells the story of the connection between artist and place—one of the most enduring connections in American art.
Co-organized by Reynolda House Museum of American Art and the Brandywine Museum of Art in Chadds Ford, it will travel to both institutions in 2025 and to the Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens in Jacksonville, Florida, in late 2025 and early 2026.
“Launching this national touring exhibition here at Reynolda House speaks to the distinction of this institution in what is known as the city of arts and innovation. I am grateful for the partnership with the Brandywine Museum of Art in co-organizing the exhibition, and I am delighted that citizens in Winston-Salem and our region have the opportunity to experience Andrew Wyeth through his evocative interpretation of the people and landscape at Kuerner Farm,” stated Allison Perkins, executive director for Reynolda House and Wake Forest University associate provost for Reynolda House & Reynolda Gardens. “Once a farm and historic estate in the early twentieth century, Reynolda today provides personal touchstones for our visitors through works of art, history, and nature. Reynolda, like Kuerner Farm, has seen its share of tremendous joy and celebration, along with heartache and tragedy—all emotions that Wyeth explores in depictions of his beloved Kuerner Farm.”
“Reynolda has been the ideal partner for the first nationally traveling exhibition of a new era,” said William L. Coleman, Ph.D., Brandywine Museum of Art’s Wyeth Foundation Curator, Director of the Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Study Center, and co-curator of the exhibition. “The strength of their collection and reputation in the field of American art made this a natural fit, as did their affiliation with Wake Forest University because of the priority both the Brandywine and the Wyeth Foundation for American Art place on scholarship.”
Andrew Wyeth’s depictions of Kuerner Farm include some of his most iconic masterworks in tempera and watercolor. He spoke often of the inspiration he found at Kuerner Farm, including one instance in which he called the charismatic pond reflecting the house “the eye of the earth,” which is the source of the exhibition title. In addition to a wide variety of loans from public and private collections, many of the artworks on view are drawn from Andrew and Betsy Wyeth’s private collection, including some that have never been exhibited before.
“Kuerner Farm completely captivated Wyeth,” said Allison C. Slaby, Reynolda’s curator and the exhibition’s co-curator. “In his depictions of the farm, we gain a sense of the Kuerner world in its entirety: the land, the hill, the pond, the house, and its inhabitants. For decades, Wyeth had free rein at this singular place. It became for him ‘a world of his own.’ This exhibition presents a refreshed approach to these works, centering this iconic place that not only captured the fascination of one of America’s most notable painters, but that also held his love and affection over the course of his life.”
Coleman continued, “We’re honored to collaborate in presenting to the public a rare assemblage of artworks from collections nationwide, including many that have never been on a museum’s walls before. These previously unexhibited paintings give new insight into a creative chapter that crystallized some of the key concerns of Andrew Wyeth’s career.”
Slaby concluded, “Andrew Wyeth at Kuerner Farm invites Museum visitors to explore the profound impact that certain places may have in their own lives. The themes explored in this exhibition are native to the human experience. It’s an exhibition for longtime Wyeth fans, curious museum-goers, and everyone in between.”
Reynolda House is grateful for the support of the following sponsors of Andrew Wyeth at Kuerner Farm: The Eye of the Earth: national sponsor, the Wells Fargo Foundation; presenting sponsors, the Cathleen and Ray McKinney Exhibition Fund; and Reynolds American.
Exhibition Catalogue
This exhibition will be accompanied by a catalogue published by Rizzoli Electa, supported by the Wyeth Foundation for American Art. Like the exhibition itself, the catalogue gives a thorough examination of Wyeth’s connection to Kuerner Farm, as told through scholarly essays authored by the co-curators: Allison C. Slaby, curator at Reynolda House and Dr. William L. Coleman, Wyeth Foundation curator and director, Andrew & Betsy Wyeth Study Center at the Brandywine Museum.
About Reynolda
Reynolda is set on 170 acres in Winston-Salem, N.C. and comprises Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Reynolda Gardens and Reynolda Village Shops and Restaurants. The Museum presents a renowned art collection in a historic and incomparable setting: the original 1917 interiors of Katharine and R.J. Reynolds’s 34,000-square-foot home. Its collection is a chronology of American art and featured exhibitions are offered in the Museum’s Babcock Wing Gallery and historic house bedrooms. The Gardens serve as a 134-acre outdoor horticultural oasis open to the public year-round, complete with colorful formal gardens, nature trails and a conservatory. In the Village, the estate’s historic buildings are now home to a vibrant mix of boutiques, restaurants, shops and services. Plan your visit at reynolda.org and use the free mobile app, Reynolda Revealed, to self-tour the estate.
Hours and Admission
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, located at 2250 Reynolda Rd., and the Reynolda Welcome Center and the Brown Family Conservatory, located at 100 Reynolda Village Way, are open to visitors Tuesday–Saturday from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Sunday from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. Admission is charged for the Museum, though several free admission categories apply. Reynolda Gardens is open from dawn to dusk daily, free of charge. Reynolda Village merchants’ hours vary. No ticket is needed to shop at the Reynolda House Museum Store.
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IMAGES can be found at www.reynolda.org/press-wyeth
MEDIA CONTACT: Brittany Norton, 336.758.5524, brittany@reynolda.org
Header image: Andrew Wyeth (1917 – 2009), Farm Pond, Study for Brown Swiss, 1957, watercolor. Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem, NC. Gift of Barbara B. Millhouse. Reynolda House is an affiliate of Wake Forest University. © 2025 Wyeth Foundation for American Art/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York