Arts & Culture

Around the turn of the century, artists, writers, activists and intellectuals created a vibrant artists’ colony in Newport. The Art Association of Newport, which later became the Newport Art Association, remains one of the oldest continuously operating art associations in the country. Its home base is the lauded Newport Art Museum, built in 1864 by Richard Morris Hunt.

Even before then, American icons like painter Gilbert Stuart; authors Julia Ward Howe, Henry James, Thornton Wilder and Edith Wharton; artist John LaFarge, architects Richard Morris Hunt, Charles McKim, Stanford White and Peter Harrison; they all lived or worked in the City-by-the-Sea.

Today, Newport’s legacy as a center for arts and culture continues seemingly around every corner.