Artist Sky Hopinka to give WCMA's Plonsker Lecture

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Artist Sky Hopinka will give the annual Plonsker Family Lecture on Thursday, April 16, at 6 p.m. at the Williams College Museum of Art (WCMA). 

The lecture will be preceded by a reception from 5 to 6 p.m.

Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians) was born and raised in Ferndale, Washington, and spent a number of years in Palm Springs and Riverside, California; Portland, Oregon; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In Portland, he studied and taught chinuk wawa, a language indigenous to the Lower Columbia River Basin. His video, photo, and text works center individual experience of Indigenous homeland and landscape and approaches to language. They act as containers of culture expressed through personal and non-fictional forms of media.

The Plonsker Family Lecture Series in Contemporary Art, established in 1994 by Madeleine Plonsker, Harvey Plonsker '61 and their son, Ted Plonsker '86, examines current issues in contemporary art. Past lecturers have included artists Stephanie Syjuco, Arthur Jafa, Lynda Benglis, Kenturah Davis, Cara Romero, and Kerry?James?Marshall.

The lecture is free and open to the public. For more information, contact the museum at 413-597-2429 or visit artmuseum.williams.edu.

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.