George Eastman House applauds Jeff Bridges on the awards he has received for his role as Bad Blake in Crazy Heart. On March 7^th, we will be waiting on the edge of our Dryden Theatre seats— along with 600 of our closest friends— at the Eastman House annual party to see if he takes home his first Oscar® as Actor in a Lead Role for the film.

Jeff Bridges earned a Golden Globe® Award in January for his role in CRAZY HEART, for which he has been nominated for an Oscar®.

During his 2004 visit to Eastman House to celebrate his exhibition Jeff Bridges —Pictures and a Dryden Theatre film series dedicated to his film career, Bridges also received the award of George Eastman Honorary Scholar for his work in motion pictures and photography. The exhibit was the first museum exhibition of his work and one of the most popular in the Museum’s history. And Bridges? Well, ‘the Dude’ was one of the most gracious, modest, and approachable artists we’ve ever hosted.

 “It is such an honor to have a photography exhibition at George Eastman House,” Bridges told the sold-out audience. “To be recognized by this incredible museum for my photography, and as a George Eastman Honorary Scholar, is one of the proudest moments of my career.”

Jeff Bridges signs a copy of his book at George Eastman House in July 2004, while talking with Eastman House Trustee Chris Pulleyn.

Past recipients of the award include actors Tony Curtis, Dennis Hopper, and Richard Widmark; filmmakers John Frankenheimer, Norman Jewison, Ken Burns, Philip Kaufman, and John Landis; cinematographer Haskell Wexler; film critic Roger Ebert; and animation artist Ray Harryhausen.

 Bridges has appeared in more than 60 motion pictures and began taking photographs as a teenager. Jeff Bridges —Pictures featured an intimate collection of images he captured of cast and crew on his movie sets (including the Coen Brothers 1998 classic, The Big Lebowski). His black-and-white pictures were shot with a Widelux F8 camera (a wedding gift from his wife, Sue) that pans nearly 180 degrees.

 “One of the things I love about the wide-format camera is that when you take the picture, many people aren’t aware that they’re in the photos,” Bridges said. “Viewers can really look around in each photograph and see many little worlds and scenes going on. I think that is more how we experience life.”

The Eastman House exhibit was based of Bridges' book PICTURES. All proceeds from the book went to charity.

Last fall, we blogged about planting the bulbs to get them ready for February (Tulips and Hyacinths and Daffodils, Oh My!, Oct. 19, 2009). Now in just over a week, spring comes early to the Eastman House when over 2,000 tulips, hyacinths, daffodils, freesias, and amaryllis will be on display for the annual Dutch Connection exhibit. It’s a welcome escape from the Rochester snow each year (especially now that Punxsutawney Phil has predicted 6 MORE weeks of winter).

For those of you in the deep freeze like us in Western NY, we invite you to enjoy this moment of spring color:

a glimpse at last year's display

The 2010 arrangement is based on George Eastman’s own selection from 100 years ago.  He ordered the bulbs from a Dutch company a year early in 1909 and grew them to maturity in his greenhouses.  Once they were organized, he would invite his friends and family to his home to enjoy the colorful display. 

The bulbs will be here February 12-28. A small exhibit will also be presented on the second floor of the house showing Mr. Eastman’s activities throughout 2010.

For  more info,visit http://www.eastmanhouse.org/Main/exhibitions/detail.php?title=dutch-connection-2010

Here is another sneak peek of some gems from the collection that will be on view during the Where We Live exhibition this Fall. This selection shows 3 of the 54 Autochromes by  Charles C. Zoller (American  1854-1934) that will be reproduced and displayed for the exhibition.  Autochromes are extremely sensitive to light so we are not able to exhibit the original object for any length of time. To work around this limitation we are making reproductions on transparency material and will display it on a large wall mounted lightbox. Nothing can recreate the experience of looking at the original object, but the display will be fabulous; seeing Rochester in color in the early 1900 hundreds is pretty cool! The collections at George Eastman House holds approximatly 4000 Autochromes by amateur photographer and Rochesterian, Charles Zoller.