Chief Executive Officer

The Roger Tory Peterson Institute (RTPI) is located in Jamestown, NY, where Roger Tory Peterson was born and raised. For 40 years, RTPI has provided a diversity of research, educational, and cultural programs. In 2021, the organization adopted a new strategic plan that places RTPI among an emerging ecosystem of museums, academic institutions, and artists’ collectives that focus on the nexus between art and nature.

As a nature art museum and home to the largest collection of Peterson’s work, RTPI presents a year-round season of exhibitions and programs of Art that Matters to the Planet.

Mission

To foster an appreciation for nature through exhibitions of Art that Matters to the Planet.

Vision

Through exhibitions and programs, the Roger Tory Peterson Institute will be an epicenter for harnessing the power of art to illuminate the beauty of nature, to raise awareness of the critical environmental challenges of our time, and to inspire preservation of the earth’s diversity of life.

Home to the largest collection of Roger Tory Peterson’s original artwork and related archival materials, RTPI will nurture the next generation of nature artists through exhibitions and artist residencies.

As a living embodiment of the Peterson Field Guide, RTPI will serve as a gateway to the best birding and natural areas throughout Western New York.

RTPI will be a leader for driving tourism to Jamestown and Chautauqua County. RTPI will provide enrichment, sanctuary, and most of all hope for all who visit.

RTPI will be a model of nonprofit sustainability.

Exhibitions

Currently, RTPI curates several exhibitions each year, anchored by its signature exhibition,Art that Matters to the Planet. Each year, this juried exhibition takes its theme from one of the Peterson Field Guides or other Peterson works. For instance,Art that Matters to the Planet:
Interconnectivityfeatured works by contemporary artists from throughout the United States in response to a call anchored by Peterson’s Field Guide to trees, as well as emerging science that helps us better understand how intimately trees are connected by vast, underground networks of roots.

To complement its main floor exhibitions, RTPI hosts simultaneous exhibitions of work by former RTPI artists-in-residence, as well as participants in the annual RTPI Plein Air Festival. The Anderson Gallery, located on the main floor, provides RTPI the opportunity to draw from its collection to introduce visitors to the diversity of Peterson’s work, and also to thematically set the stage for main floor exhibitions.

The Peterson Collection

RTPI is home to the largest collection of Peterson’s original artworks, films and slides, personal effects, and other archival materials. To explore the collection is to join him as he traveled the world in search of birds and other fauna and flora to paint, photograph, film, and in many instances, protect. At RTPI, our job is to steward this unique, world-class collection, to make it accessible to scholars and researchers, and to share it as broadly and creatively as we can with artists, conservationists and lovers of nature all over the world.

Programs

RTPI offers a range of rotating programs that blend art, nature, and education to honor Peterson’s legacy. Signature events include Art After 5, Yoga with the Birds, the Banff Film Festival, Summer Soiree, RTPI Bluebird Festival, Roger’s Bird-Day Bash, the RTPI Plein Air Festival, and Holidays at the Lodge.

Other initiatives include rotating exhibitions focused on environmental themes, guided birding walks, art and conservation workshops, and interactive school and youth group field trips.

The Peterson Preserve

The Lodge at RTPI is nested within a 27-acre nature preserve of wildflower gardens, pollinator meadows, and mature stands of hemlock trees. The Peterson Preserve is a sanctuary for visitors. A refuge for wildlife. A learning laboratory for us all.

Artist-in-Residence Program

Roger Tory Peterson was the very first “scholar-in-residence” at Fallingwater, Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural masterpiece, located in Mill Run, PA. During his residency, he completed the artwork for hisField Guide to Mexican Birds. With our…