By
KEVIN O’CONNOR/VTDigger
Lyman Orton arrived at a local auction six decades ago in hopes of furnishing his first house, only to spy a seemingly simple yet thought-provoking framed landscape.“The whole idea that artists fell in love with the state and then painted it was just fascinating to me,” the patriarch of the family that owns the Vermont Country Store recently recalled.The 85-year-old has since amassed what Yankee Magazine deemed “the largest private collection of 20th-century Vermont art in the world.” More than 300 works have filled his home, office, touring exhibits — and starting June 7, their first single, permanent showplace.The Southern Vermont Arts Center, a 120-acre Manchester campus anchored by the century-old Yester House mansion, is set to open a two-floor, 12,000-square-foot addition as part of a $14.5 million capital project.“I feel this has been a hidden gem for 100 years,” Executive Director Amelia Wiggins said in an interview. “We’re trying to unhide it.”
The Richmond-based architecture and building company Birdseye designed the new wing to feature Orton’s “For the Love of Vermont” collection, as well as a rooftop terrace and lower-level gallery named for Bob Van Degna, president of the center’s board of trustees and a top project donor. The expansion includes a climate-controlled storage space for 1,000 other works accumulated since the nonprofit’s founding three-quarters of a century ago.
