Reimagining Hope, 2025

Longhouse Reserve, East Hampton, NY

Hope Sandrow’s video of her installation, Reimagining Hope at LongHouse Reserve Invitational, ON+OFF the Ground XII in East Hampton, NY

Flower Campsis radicans (Trumpet Vine flower) July 25 2025

Artist Statement: 

Hope Sandrow

Reimagining Hope: plant a seedling sprouted from an acorn imbued with (oak) knowledge at LongHouse Reserve 

Within a golden rectangle in the study Mother of Pearl, Lookback Window, Women’s Circle’s open air studio Shinnecock Hills spacetime 2025

Found materials and objects (aka ready mades) in hand include Iron Trellis, 50 pieces of glass ware each representing a year since Larsen acquired 16 acres (machine made pearlescent Depression Amber glass plates, tea cups and fluted bowls; iridescent handmade fluted Carnival Marigold glass bowls; three blown glass Libby Golden Foliage bowls; one fluted glass Walt Disney World), awarded as prizes at carnivals and fairs "during challenging times"; oak seedlings sprouted from acorns, ceramic bud vases, mother of pearl and colored glass fragments, trumpet vine flowers, Richard Lear Memorial Teahouse, leather, hand dyed Great Women Rulers, binder clips, oak leaves.  Installation size variable LongHouse Reserve Planters Invitational: ON+OFF the Ground XII.

Reframing Yoko Ono's practice of uniting life with her art sited at LongHouse: here nature and the natural world intertwine with Wish Tree (2016), Grow Love With Me, Play It By Trust (1999). And around the world in collaboration with John Lennon: Acorns for Peace (1968 - 1970; reprised 1996; 2009) initiated their quest for world peace. 

Make a donation to plant an oak seedling grown from an acorn in Sandrow's open air studio Shinnecock Hills, a living art installation founded, inspired by a Chance Encounter (2006) in the woods. The maturing oaks will be monuments to peace and love, honoring the Fluxus artist Ono, who radically affected culture through constructive conversations.

Reimagining Hope exhibits our on and off again relationships to one another, to nature, and our natural world. The vulnerability of seedlings amongst a canopy of mature oak trees. Glassware exhibits fragility; colors likened to egg yolk. Hues and framing in response to the Richard Lear Memorial Garden Tea House. Mother of Pearl flakes scattered atop colored glass fragments and coarse gravel juxtapose the challenges of “ today" with the turbulent decades of the last century that informed Lennon and Ono’s collaborations.  Amidst progress: Earth Day (Sandrow attended the first (1970) in Fairmont Park, Philadelphia); Equal Rights Amendment approved by Congress (1972). Subjects amongst conversation following meals by her grandmother, Pearl and her mother, Ruth as they cleared the family table of dishes and glasses, washed by hand, dried and stacked on shelves…  sharing cups of tea. Their practice of nurturing flora and fauna included taking Sandrow by hand to collect monies, door-to-door from neighbors, to plant trees. On Sunday evenings watching Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color (1969 - 1979). 

Reimagining Hope is a site-specific mixed-media installation celebrating fifty years since (1975) founder Jack Lenor Larsen  (1927-2020) acquired the 16 acres that define LongHouse Reserve’s integrated landscape. Larsen found inspiration in the 7th-century Shinto shrine at Ise, Japan; his intention to “serve as a living case study of the interaction between plants and people in the 21st century” exploring the relationship between shared personal and communal ecosystems. At the same time, a practice investigated by his colleagues, Robert Dash (Madoo,1967), Agnes Dennis (Wheatfields,1982, Joseph Beuys (7000 Oaks, 1982), and Robert Wilson (Watermill Center,1992); and a foundation of Sandrow’s. Titling works of art her given name "Hope” is Sandrow's practice as in hope and fear (1986) to recently (2023) Hope is the thing with feathers.

"I don’t believe in art. I believe in artists.” Marcel Duchamp

Hope Sandrow’s video II of her installation, Reimagining Hope at LongHouse Reserve Invitational, ON+OFF the Ground XII in East Hampton, NY