Clark Art Screens Free Pastoral on Paper Film Series

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — This April and May, the Clark Art Institute hosts a series of films celebrating the Pastoral on Paper exhibition, with films that introduce some kind of conflict into peaceful landscapes in the rural United States, France, and Ireland.

All films are free and screened in the Manton Research Center auditorium on select Thursdays at 6 pm.

April 24
Days of Heaven (1978)
After accidentally killing his foreman at a steelworks in Chicago, laborer Bill, (Richard Gere) goes westward to the Texas plains with his girlfriend, Abby (Brooke Adams), and younger sister (Linda Manz). Posing as siblings, the trio find work in the wheat fields. To escape their life of toil, Bill convinces Abby to marry a wealthy but dying farmer (Sam Shepard). The ensuing love triangle binds the three together as they circle around the idyllic landscape. The lonely beauty of Terrence Malick’s film pays homage to the paintings of Edward Hopper and Andrew Wyeth. (Run time: 1 hour, 34 minutes)

May 15
The Quiet Man (1952)
Both an exemplary and a unique example of director John Ford's use of landscape, The Quiet Man longs for an unregainable past, for tradition and ceremony, and for the peace and escape of an idyllic country. Set in the 1920s, the film stars Ford’s muse, John Wayne, as Sean Thornton, a recently retired boxer who has travelled from America to his birthplace of Innisfree to lay claim to his family farm. (Run time: 2 hours, 9 minutes)

May 22
Jean de Florette (1988)
This engrossing epic of greed and deception is set amid the bucolic splendor of the Provence countryside. Gérard Depardieu gives one of his great performances as the hunchbacked city slicker Jean, who is determined to make a success of the farm he has inherited—unaware that his new neighbor César (Yves Montand) and his nephew Ugolin (Daniel Auteuil) have launched a ruthless scheme to take control of the land for themselves. (Run time: 2 hours)

Free. Accessible seats available; for information, call 413 458 0524. For more information, visit clarkart.edu/events.

Lanesborough Officials Review Schools' Budgets

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:49AM / Thursday, April 09, 2026

Mount Greylock Superintendent Joseph Bergeron, left, addresses the Lanesborough Select Board and Finance Committee as School Committee member Curtis Elfenbein looks at the projection of a slide in the district's budget presentation.

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — Town officials Monday appeared generally receptive to the fiscal year 2027 spending plans for the two public school districts that serve the town.

 

Superintendents from the Northern Berkshire Vocational Regional School District (McCann Technical School) and Mount Greylock Regional School District presented their respective FY27 budgets to a joint meeting of the town's Finance Committee and Select Board.

 

Both districts are sending significantly higher assessments for approval at Lanesborough's annual town meeting in June.

 

McCann Tech, which constituted a $317,109 expenditure for the town in the current fiscal year, is seeking $463,978 for the fiscal year that begins on July 1 even though the school's operating budget is up just 3.2 percent year to year.

 

The 46 percent increase in Lanesborough's share of McCann Tech's budget is is due to two factors: a rise in enrollment of town residents at the vocational school from 20 in 2025 to 29 in this school year and a capital assessment for the first round of payments — for interest only — for a roof and window replacement project on the North Adams campus.

 

The Mount Greylock assessment, a much larger component of Lanesborough's property tax bill, is up 10.99 percent from FY26 to FY27, from $6.8 million to $7.6 million.

 

Mount Greylock Superintendent Joseph Bergeron gave a budget presentation similar to one he has delivered twice to the district's School Committee and again last month to the Williamstown Finance Committee, explaining that while the FY27 budget maintains level services to students with a net reduction of three positions, a series of factors are driving much larger assessments to Mount Greylock's two member towns.