Olana Partnership

Education / interpretation: top's visitor services (vs) team enjoyed a successful 2023, welcoming over 37,000 guests on public tours, a 9% increase over 2022. Revenue exceeded projections by 10%, and approximately 20% of park visitors at Olana enjoyed a ticketed tour. During The summer and fall seasons, roughly 20% of tickets sold were landscape tours which includes walking, electric vehicle, and combo tours, and overall landscape tour attendance continues to increase year over year. The introduction of The 3-in-1 combo tour, landscape-main floor-exhibition, helped drive attendance on walking landscape tours and top welcomed 1,000 additional guests on landscape tours in 2023, an increase of more than 35%. We continued to encourage visitors to explore The landscape on their own as well, utilizing a free map or audio guide download. Visitors actively utilized tour ticketing discounts, resulting in $43,000 in adult public ticket savings and $34,000 in savings for guests 16 years old and under, who receive free admission. Notably, The library pass program continued to grow, and use on main floor tours was up 30% over The previous year, representing $19,000 in visitor savings. Top was pleased to welcome back 15 experienced interpretive staff members for The summer and fall seasons, in addition to hiring 3 new part-time interpretive staff and 2 new part-time visitor services and engagement coordinators staff. These seasonal staff members joined other top and oprhp colleagues for Olana university, our three-day intensive training workshop held in late april of 2023. In 2023, we successfully launched a limited run of spanish language tours, working together with top's marketing and education teams on targeted promotion and outreach.

Visitor services: The organization is responsible for interpreting Olana state historic site and its collections for all visitors and for ensuring, to The best of its ability, The safety and comfort of visitors. To this end, The organization offers a variety of regularly scheduled public tours throughout The year with trained interpretive staff. It also employs and trains staff to assist visitors with orientation, wayfinding, ticketing, and parking. By The terms of The operating agreement with nys oprhp, The organization must have a visitor services manager on site during all public tour hours.

Collections / exhibitions: this was a year of growth for top's curatorial department, as we welcomed a new exhibitions manager, blakely kralovec, and brought on dr. elizabeth kornhauser, curator emerita of The american wing at The metropolitan museum of art, as senior consulting curator. Dr. kornhauser will be activating museums and scholars nationwide to participate in church 200, our 2026 initiative marking The bicentennial of frederic church's birth. Blakely kralovec, who brings more than 15 years of experience in collections and exhibitions management to her role, has implemented new organizational processes and expanded our capacity to take on ambitious exhibitions. From may-october we presented terraforming: Olana's historic photography collection unearthed, an indoor-outdoor exhibition curated by artist david hartt. Featuring 50 original 19th-century photographic prints collected by frederic church, plus six large-scale reproductions of church-owned photographs placed in The historic landscape and two new site-specific artworks by hartt, terraforming excavated Olana's remarkable treasure trove of historic photography to explore questions of human relationships with The land. The accompanying catalogue featured 136 historic images selected by hartt, along with essays by hartt and photography historian corey keller. In november we opened our second winter exhibition, spectacle: frederic church and The business of art, which responded to two of our most frequently asked questions: how were church's paintings experienced in The 19th century, and how did an artist make enough money to create Olana? Spectacle featured a 2.5d digital exploration of church's 1859 masterpiece heart of The andes, originally produced by The smithsonian american art museum. Artifacts from Olana's archives that illuminate church's business practices were on view in The gallery. In research and collections, mary roberts, a scholar of orientalist art at The university of sydney, explored Olana's historic library for an investigation of church's architectural influences. Victoria johnson visited The nys bureau of historic sites collections facility to inform her work on The first holistic biography of church. We hosted shannon vittoria, The met's assistant curator of american paintings and sculpture, for a deep dive into church's years in mexico for a future exhibition. The painting a solitary lake in new hampshire by thomas cole left Olana to receive conservation treatment in anticipation of a loan to a traveling exhibition organized by The thomas cole national historic site focusing on indigeneity and landscape painting. These projects are among many ongoing that will continue to raise Olana's profile and foster new scholarly perspectives on church's life and work, more than ever as we build towards 2026.

Landscape / viewshed: The mingled flower garden is enjoyed by thousands of visitors each year and blooms consistently from april through november. The maintenance of this garden continues to be generously funded by top supporters, serra and glenn butash. Two undeveloped land parcels (about 25 acres total) across route 9g went on The market in late 2023. This land was also close to The rip van winkle bridge and The hudson river skywalk route. Even though it would be challenging to develop this property due to topography and wetland constraints, this sale was considered a threat, and top alerted our conservation partners at scenic hudson, who did a site visit and initial analysis. Ultimately, a conversation-minded buyer purchased The parcels, so any immediate threat of development has passed. The older communications towers on blue hill continue to be visible from key locations at Olana. These defunct towers were supposed to be removed after a new tripod replacement tower on blue hill was erected several years ago. In late 2023, we learned from scenic hudson that The national park service historic landmark program had prodded The federal communications commission (fcc) for an update about The removal of these older towers. The fcc responded that they had learned from The tower's owner, that The last tenant on The older towers had finally vacated and that The towers would finally be removed in spring 2024.

Capital development: The farm complex construction project was completed in 2023, as planned and has provided immediate benefits for visitors and staff. The view from crown hill over Olana's historic farm zone no longer includes a parking lot and cars. This new parking lot is surrounded by native plantings and provides safer pedestrian access to Olana's farm buildings and lake road. Top is now positioned to think more about The future of Olana's historic kitchen garden and The main barn. Activating The farm at Olana has always been a core idea within The Olana strategic design plan and The siting of The frederic church center (fcc). 2023 was The sixth year of top's capital campaign to fund The design and construction of The frederic church center for art & landscape (fcc), a new visitor entry and orientation facility that is The linchpin of Olana's strategic landscape design plan. As of 12/31/23, top had raised $1,815,058. The first phase of The fcc's construction, site clearance and major earthwork, was completed in The first quarter of 2023. Construction of The building and its surrounding landscape began immediately after on a fast-track basis under The overall management of oprhp and with liro as cm and mlb as The gc. As of The end of 2023, The building shell was completed and weatherproofed, and The project was on track for completion in autumn 2024. Top spent much of 2023 working with pure + applied, alongside oprhp staff, on interpretive content for The interior and exterior of The fcc. The designs were finalized by The end of 2023, and and southside design & build were selected from three bidders to build and install The exhibits. All capital development projects are The result of a long-term commitment to Olana's 250-acre landscape, an improvement of public access while balancing The broader interpretative goals which are essential to understanding Olana as both a nationally significant historic site and a large-scale work of art.

Museum store: top continued to grow its staff in 2021 to expand its capacity to serve The expanded programmatic responsibilities under its cooperative agreement with nys parks and to prepare for The significant infrastructure expansion to be provided by The frederic church center. In 2022 top restructured senior staff to create The new executive position of vp of visitor engagement and business operations and change The museum shop manager position to The director of retail operations, a senior staff position, reporting to The vp. Museum store sales were very robust for The year as top resumed full visitor operations.