Explore our online exhibitions
An Enduring Presence: The Old Man of the Mountain
Twenty years ago, the Old Man of the Mountain fell from its perch high above Franconia Notch. Many admirers in New Hampshire and beyond mourned the loss. For more than 200 years the jagged ledges that formed a human profile promoted New Hampshire’s identity, inspired works of art and literature, and symbolized the beauty and fragile environment of the White Mountains.
As Time Passes Over the Land: White Mountain Art
This exhibit pairs contemporary professional New England regional poets and printmakers with PSU student work with the common theme of responding to the White Mountains as a place.
Beyond Brown Paper
The Brown Company Collection documents much of the history of the Brown Company of Berlin, New Hampshire from the late nineteenth century through the mid-1960s. This is an educational resource that chronicles engineering projects, mill construction, equipment installation, as well as the social, cultural, and recreational lives of the workers, their families, and Berlin itself.
Beyond Granite: The Geology of Adventure
The Beyond Granite exhibition explores the geological underpinnings of three of the most popular forms of recreation in the White Mountains: climbing, hiking, and skiing/snowboarding. We investigate the fundamental Earth processes that have shaped these mountains we love, and we make the connections between the stories of our outdoor pursuits and the stories of the land itself.
Endangered Invasive and Undiscovered [Species]
This exhibition features environmental artwork from Kimberly Ritchie’s recent sabbatical experiences in Greece and Iceland. The exhibit also highlights faculty led, student made, collaborative work from interdisciplinary projects across campus, involving the intersection of the human race and the natural world that impacts endangered, invasive, undiscovered, and evolving species.
Extending Ecology: Making Meaning with the White Mountains
This exhibition features environmental artwork from Kimberly Ritchie’s recent sabbatical experiences in Greece and Iceland. The exhibit also highlights faculty led, student made, collaborative work from interdisciplinary projects across campus, involving the intersection of the human race and the natural world that impacts endangered, invasive, undiscovered, and evolving species.
Field Station: Art-Science in the White Mountains
Long a site of collaboration for scientists, for the last decade the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest has encouraged artists to join their ongoing conversations. The artists in the exhibition have all spent time in the forest and with the scientists.
Finding Place on Paper: Contemporary Poets and Printmakers Explore the White Mountains
This exhibit pairs contemporary professional New England regional poets and printmakers with PSU student work with the common theme of responding to the White Mountains as a place.
Finding Place on Paper: Contemporary Poets and Printmakers Explore the White Mountains
Forecasting: Climate Change and Water Impact
This exhibit explores climate change overlapping the lens of scientific information with artistic imagery and expression, inviting the viewer to engage in the material via contemporary art installations and scientific data concerning oceans of the world, waterways, atmosphere, and drought. This interdisciplinary experience highlights the power of combining different critical thinking pathways to deepen understanding of climate change’s relevance to the individual.
Forest to Forest: Bicknell’s Thrush
The Bicknell’s Thrush, a rare bird that breeds in the White Mountains inspired this multi-year, multiphase international cluster project and interdisciplinary exhibit. This exhibit examines issues like land management, deforestation, New Hampshire tourism, economic development, gender studies, and international environmental, social, and political impact. PSU students have been involved in the project, interacting with key partners, and developing effective conservation advocacy initiatives related to this special bird.
Guy Shorey: Among the White Hills
Plymouth State University is honored to present Guy Shorey: Among the White Hills. This exhibition shows the scope of Shorey’s work that was so important in recording the people and places, as well as the work and leisure activity in the White Mountains region in the early-to-mid-twentieth century.
Industrial Explorers: Research and Development at the Brown Company, Berlin, NH 1915-1968
The Berlin, NH, company pioneered a number of innovations, driven by a desire to make better use of the forest as a resource for a wide array of products—from “aeroplane spruce” to “kraft” pulp/paper, and including some unlikely stops along the way (“Kream Krisp,” anyone?).
Industrial Explorers: Research and Development at the Brown Company, Berlin, NH 1915-1968
Lasting Impressions: A Juried Alumni Arts Exhibition
Lasting Impressions showcases multiple generations of PSC/ PSU art, writing, music, theater, and dance alumni, highlighting the importance of place as well as the University’s history of incubating critical thinking and artistry. Including recent graduates to established artists, writers, musicians, dancers, and actors, Lasting Impressions is a collection of works that convey the role the White Mountains, teachings, experiences, landscape, and ideas encountered here in influencing these artists’ creative journey and developing careers.
Of Baskets and Borers: The Past, Present, and Future of Indigenous Basketry in the White Mountains
Since the glaciers receded 12,000 years ago and the temperate forest grew up behind them, Indigenous peoples have called this region Ndakina, home. Over many generations, they developed reciprocal relationships with the land, water, plants, and animals. This exhibition explores one of those relationships – one that they developed with the brown ash tree.
Of Baskets and Borers: The Past, Present, and Future of Indigenous Basketry in the White Mountains
Passing Through: The Allure of the White Mountains Online Exhibition
Focusing on five distinct areas—Crawford Notch, Mount Washington Valley (eastern slopes), the Summit of Mount Washington, the Northern Presidentials, and Franconia Notch—visitors will think more deeply about the White Mountain region and the evolving human experience of it.
Passing Through: The Allure of the White Mountains Online Exhibition
Plymouth State in 150 Objects
The exhibition aims to highlight the sense of place at Plymouth State that has always been important for the people who live, work, teach, and learn here. Images, artifacts, and stories gathered from all corners of the past and present PSU community will illustrate how Plymouth State continues to grow and evolve, responding to the needs and circumstances of its campus and community.
Process Meets Practice: Balancing Creating and Teaching
Process Meets Practice shines a light on five women artists who have taught and led at Plymouth State University and the PSU Art Department. This exhibit explores how these artists created, instructed, and inspired hundreds of art students over the years in a traditionally male-dominated field. Process Meets Practice features drawings, paintings, prints, sculptures, photographs, and stories that celebrate these women and their lasting impact on PSU.
Protecting the Forest: The Weeks Act of 1911
Not only does the White Mountain region have a long history of maps and map makers, it also boasts one of the richest assortment of map designs of any mountainous region. Each map describes specific places and routes, and also tells a story of the knowledge, curiosity, purposes, pleasures, and design ideas of the people of its time. This interactive exhibit will feature maps from the far and recent past, as well as new map tools for today’s hikers, tourists, scientists, weekend explorers, and enthusiasts.
Remembering Jay
On March 31, 2020, our great friend Jay Moskowitz passed away from cancer. Jay was a teaching lecturer at Plymouth State University for over twenty years, and a beloved mentor, supporter, friend, and more to all who knew him. He will be greatly missed. A well-traveled folk musician and artist, Jay said “My real art is teaching. It is where I really put most of my creative energies.”
Space 2 Place: A Philosopher's Journey Across America
Not only does the White Mountain region have a long history of maps and map makers, it also boasts one of the richest assortment of map designs of any mountainous region. Each map describes specific places and routes, and also tells a story of the knowledge, curiosity, purposes, pleasures, and design ideas of the people of its time. This interactive exhibit will feature maps from the far and recent past, as well as new map tools for today’s hikers, tourists, scientists, weekend explorers, and enthusiasts.
Summer Camps: The White Mountains Roots of an Iconic American Experience
Our Summer Camps exhibition traces the sparks cast by the Transcendentalists and the early White Mountain tourists. They were the kindling for the first American summer camps that caught fire along the shores of Squam Lake and became the popular camps of the Progressive Era. These led to the torches carried forth by generations of campers from then to now.
Summer Camps: The White Mountains Roots of an Iconic American Experience
Taking the Lead: Women and the White Mountains
Ever since the White Mountains regions became part of the national consciousness, women as well as men have been drawn to them. What may surprise people is how often women have been leaders in the regions: from farm wives to climbers, from early hikers to modern businesswomen, from early conservationists to today’s environmentalists. The mountainous region gave women a place to explore their talents and creativity uninhibited by the constraints of urban life.
The Grand Hotels of the White Mountains Online Exhibition
Explore The Grand Hotels of the White Mountains, featuring the origins, development, and history of New Hampshire’s grand resort hotels. The creative visual journey includes paintings, photographs, various artifacts, and stories of the people who visited and worked at these gracious establishments.
The Great Blowdown: The Effects of the Hurricane of 1938 in Northern New England
The Great Blowdown is a panel exhibition inspired by curator Dr. Lourdes Aviles’ new book Taken By Storm, 1938, A Social and Meteorological History of the Great New England Hurricane.
The Great Blowdown: The Effects of the Hurricane of 1938 in Northern New England
Trail Clubs: Connecting People with the Mountains
For 140 years trail clubs have been instrumental in the development of the White Mountains as a destination for visitors and residents seeking physical exertion, scenic beauty, spiritual refreshment, and hearty fellowship on mountain trails.
Vernal Pool: Local Action to Preserve Biodiversity
Katama Murray brought the Museum of the White Mountains an exhibit where science meets art and design. This exhibit illustrated a comprehensive effort to map vernal pool resources within the greater Plymouth area. It also documented the presence and absence of amphibian species of special concern and species of greatest conservation need as identified by the New Hampshire Wildlife Action Plan.
Walking in the Whites: A Poet/Painter Dialogue
Featuring works by visual artist Kathryn Field and poet Timothy Muskat, this interactive and dynamic experience will engage visitors in a sense of place through words and images focused on the experience of the White Mountains.
Wayfinding: Maps of the White Mountains
Not only does the White Mountain region have a long history of maps and map makers, it also boasts one of the richest assortment of map designs of any mountainous region. Each map describes specific places and routes, and also tells a story of the knowledge, curiosity, purposes, pleasures, and design ideas of the people of its time. This interactive exhibit will feature maps from the far and recent past, as well as new map tools for today’s hikers, tourists, scientists, weekend explorers, and enthusiasts.
