The AXA Gallery presents works from all fields of the visual arts, including exhibitions originating outside New York that would not otherwise have a presence in the city. On display until July 13, 2002 is Testimony: Vernacular Art of the African-American South. The exhibition encompasses more than 60 works - including paintings, drawings and sculpture by self-taught African-American artists. These artists range from the most celebrated practitioners such as James "Son" Thomas of Mississippi, famous both as a blues musician and an artist and Bessie Harvey of Tennessee, whose sculptures were included in the 1995 Whitney Biennial to those artists who are less well known yet no less remarkable. Thornton Dial Sr. and his extraordinary extended family of artists constitute the largest group of works. Look for the future exhibit, Perfect Acts of Architecture to be displayed August 15 – October 19, 2002. The gallery is located at 787 Seventh Avenue at 51^st Street and is open Monday - Friday: 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., Saturdays: Noon - 5:00 p.m. and is closed on Sundays. Admission is FREE and the entrance is wheelchair-accessible. For information, please call (212) 554-4818 or go to their web-site, www.axa-financial.com/aboutus/gallery.html.

The Paine Webber Art Gallery features short-term exhibitions from New York cultural institutions. In the past the gallery has been host to exhibits exploring diverse subject matter from children’s art to Mayan weavings, landscape designing, contemporary folk art sports photography. The current exhibit on display through June 21, 2002 is A Century on Paper: Prints by Art Students League Artists 1901-2001. This exhibit celebrates the tradition of printmaking through the 20^th century, as well as the rich history of the Art Students League. Founded in 1875 as a democratic collective of artists, the League on West 57 Street, has been attended by many of America’s outstanding artists, from Social Realists to Abstract Expressionists. Assembled from the League’s permanent collection, with loans from individuals and print dealers, the exhibition presents works by artists who taught or studied at the League. A Century on Paper: Prints by Art Students League Artists 1901-2001 includes, among others, work by John Sloan, George Bellows, Will Barnet, Harry Sternberg, Martin Lewis and Robert Kipniss. The UBS Paine Webber Art Gallery is located at 1285 Avenue of the Americas (between 51st and 52nd Streets.) The gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 8:00am to 6:00pm and admission is FREE. For information on this and future events, please call the gallery at (212) 713-2885 or go the UBS Paine Webber web site, www.ubspainewebber.com/PWIC/CDA/main/1,1194,SE82-L1100-L2122-L3128-EN128,00.html.

On display until June 22, 2002 at the Gallery of the American Bible Society is In Search of Mary Magdalene: Images and Traditions. The exhibit has been called "an intriguing show" by The NY Times and hailed as an "excellent exhibition" by the Daily News. The Gallery at the American Bible Society is unique in it is New York City’s only exhibition space dedicated solely to Judeo-Christian art and the inspiration it has found in the Bible. The gallery is located at 1865 Broadway at 61^st Street and admission is FREE. The hours are Monday through Wednesday and Friday 10:00am - 6:00pm; Thursday 10:00am - 7:00pm and Saturday 10:00am -5:00pm. For information, please call the gallery at (212) 408-1500 or go to their web site, www.americanbible.org/gallery.

The Lobby Gallery, 31 West 52 Street between Fifth Avenue and Sixth Avenue has many exhibits throughout the year that feature a myriad of artists and genres. The Lobby Gallery was created to further support and encourage understanding of the arts. Featuring seven shows annually, The Lobby Gallery seeks to extend Deutsche Bank's commitment to the visual arts, offering a variety of contemporary art exhibitions for the benefit of employees who work in the building, as well as the visiting public and the international art community. Besides exhibiting artwork from Deutsche Bank's own collections in New York and Europe, there are collaborations with outside galleries and public art organizations. The gallery is open daily 9:00am – 6:00pm. For more information, please go to their web site, www.db.com/art/htm/gallery.htm.

The Dahesh Museum of Art is the only museum in America dedicated to collecting and exhibiting 19th and early 20th-century European academic art, which is the continuation of the great Renaissance, Baroque and Rococo traditions in the visual arts. The Museum is a leader in rediscovering the rich art and history of the French Academy, the British Royal Academy and other centers of artistic tradition throughout the Western world. The basis of the Museum is an extensive art collection acquired by the writer and philosopher Dr. Dahesh (1909-1984), who lived in Beirut, Lebanon. Dr. Dahesh envisioned a museum of European academic art in Beirut but in 1975, when Lebanon's civil war put the collection at risk, it was brought to the United States. The Museum was chartered in 1987 and opened to the public in January 1995. The upcoming exhibit at the museum is Fire & Ice: Treasures from the Photographic Collection of Frederic Church at Olana (June 4 – August 24, 2002.) The exhibit focuses on the work of artist Frederic Edwin Church (1826-1900) one of the first American artists to be accorded international acclaim. Mr. Church is perhaps best known for such monumental canvases as The Heart of the Andes, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; Niagara, at The Corcoran Gallery of Art, as well as his exotic Moorish style home, "Olana," now an historic site in Hudson, New York. His was the first generation of painters to grow up with photographs as a normal adjunct to an artist's life and work. Though not a practitioner in the new media himself, Church was a prodigious collector of photography. Fire & Ice is the first exhibition to explore Church's interest in photography and its relationship to his painting and the first time these works will be seen by the public. The exhibition showcases some 55 of the most important photos in Church's extensive collection which is currently being catalogued and conserved. Examples of Church's oil sketches and decorative motifs used in designing Olana, will be shown alongside the photos, illuminating the taste and working methods of this great American painter. Renowned photographers such as Carleton Watkins, Desiree Charnay, William James Stillman and Eadweard Muybridge are also represented, as are some less known and anonymous masters. The works depict many of the same places to which Church traveled to paint - North and South America, the Caribbean, the Polar North region and the Middle East. The Dahesh Museum of Art is conveniently located at 601 Fifth Avenue, 2nd floor, between 48th and 49th Streets. Admission is free. The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 11:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M. For information, please go to their web site, www.daheshmuseum.org.