Art Finds a Home at Crossroads Farm

Art has come to Park Avenue.

Patch interviewed owner Cherie Via Rexer about the RIPE Art Gallery at Rexer's Crossroads Farm at 1028 Park Ave., just north of Jericho Turnpike. 

Question: What does your gallery offer?
Answer: Well. We offer high quality custom picture framing out of our on site frame shop. We have what the industry calls an "old man" shop, meaning that we do everything by hand, including joining our frames and cutting glass and mats, all by hand. All our work is done on premises, and everything is done by myself and my assistants. We offer the largest selection of frames around, including some of the most unusual frames available,  and we offer competitive pricing. We've been lucky to retain our long time clients, as well as, in our new location, gain new clients.
    Our art gallery is newly expanded into a separate building, inspired by a visit to the new Parrish Museum. My husband re-built an existing barn on the property which we outfitted with the most energy efficient lighting system available. We continue to represent Long Island-based folk, self-taught, and visionary artists, and most recently we have featured an artist from Sweden, and this weekend we open a show by a husband and wife team from Central Pennsylvania. We pride ourselves in bringing some of the most imaginative and unusual art we can find to our community.
    We also have a boutique of handmade jewelry and accessories, like scarves, handbags, and clothing. Our boutique also offers fun gift items, framed and unframed vintage prints, labels, and photography, locally made pottery, books and puzzles, ornaments, and seasonal decorative items. We even have a selection of new and used cd's!

Q.: What's your background, such as expertise or experience?
A: I majored in music at Ithaca College, and a high school teaching job brought me to Long Island from my home in New Jersey. After five years of working in the public school system, I left my tenured position, and fell into a job in a Huntington frame shop. That's where I learned the business of picture framing, and I started studying art history on my own time. After several years at that shop in Huntington, I started freelancing in other North Shore frame shops and galleries. I started RIPE Art Gallery in 2004, and simply started showing my friend's artwork. Then before I knew it artists started coming to me, looking to be shown. I'm basically a self-taught gallery owner and curator, and during this time I have discovered that I have a talent for hanging shows. Nothing I can pinpoint- just something that I'm told I am good at!

Q.: Who should be interested/who do the works appeal to?
 A.: The work I show appeals to a younger audience looking for artwork that steps out of the bounds of what other galleries present. I don't show lighthouses or flowers as we are used to seeing them. My audience comes to me for something different, something that stretches the imagination. Mysterious, nefarious, sometimes vulgar or gruesome, sometimes off-putting, usually humorous- this is what I look for in artist's work, and this is what RIPE is known for.

Q.: How did you land at this location, which is a little off the Huntington cultural track?
A.: My husband, Robert Rexer, has owned the property known as Crossroads Farm in Huntington for 26 years. The property has been known by this name since 1880 when the Ruhl family operated a chicken farm at the premises. After running the property as an organic farm in the 1990’s, raising poultry, eggs, produce and bedding plants, the site became a nursery in 1999. Today we are breathing new life into this gateway to Huntington at the corner of Park Avenue and Broadway/Greenlawn Road.  Sitting just ¾ of a mile north of Jericho Turnpike, Rexer’s Crossroads Farm is fusing agriculture and art. Robert, a general contractor/builder, hopes to restore the farm to its former glory. He has a pending application with the Town’s Building Department for the repair and rebuilding of the main barn on the property. His goal is to improve all of the agricultural, sales, and residential structures on the property.  We also hope this spring to add nursery and farm retail sales to what RIPE already offers.

Q.: Anything else? 
    Robert and I live in Huntington, and we are very excited about what our enterprise could turn into! We are currently recruiting talented, energetic people with agricultural, horticultural, floral and retail backgrounds, the greenhouses and cold frames are being updated for early spring propagation of unusual varieties of flowering plants, succulents, organic herbs, fruits and vegetables. The grounds will have outdoor sitting areas surrounded by various themed gardens and outdoor sculpture displays. The gallery barn will continue to bring exciting art to our community, and we hope to start using a portion of our barn for art classes and workshops. The future is bright!.