Signs of the Times: Nantucket Signs Exhibition of the Nantucket Historical Association

Easy Street Boat Basin
1924 to 1945

A true icon of the artist colony on Nantucket that burgeoned in the 1920s, the Easy Street Gallery was founded in 1924 by patron and artist Florence Lang in a building she purchased and moved from South Beach Street (formerly a cooper’s shop, and then Hayden’s Bath House). The Easy Street Gallery soon became legendary, with exhibitions open to all island artists, launching a tradition of inclusion that is institutionalized today as the Artists’ Association. Shows ran for several weeks in August and could boast many of the island’s finest artists, among them Ruth Haviland Sutton, Tony Sarg, Frank Swift Chase, Anne Ramsdell Congdon, and Edgar Jenney. The gallery continued to offer lively exhibitions throughout the prewar period, fostering the spirit of art on the island and providing a hub and a meeting place for members of Nantucket’s art community. In 1945, the Easy Street Gallery was succeeded by the Kenneth Taylor Galleries on Straight Wharf, which from 1946 until 1988 would house the Artists’ Association of Nantucket.

Florence Clifford, whose great-aunt, Florence Lang, founded and directed the Easy Street Gallery, recalls that art openings in those days were relatively genteel affairs, with tea and cookies served in the afternoon.

P8615

Florence Lang F1929