Night of 100 Plates: A Feast to Help Feed the Hungry

Cultural correspondent Bess J.M. Hochstein reports from Pittsfield: Art dealers Leslie Ferrin and Donald Clark were thinking of ways to give back to the community during the holidays, so they decided to host a festive dinner to benefit St. Stephen’s Table on November 21. The meal followed the opening reception for Ferrin’s annual, gift-oriented "Small Works" exhibition as well as a show called "Paper-or-Pottery-not Plastic", which includes artist-designed paper plates ($100) and pottery plates ($35 -$100.) At one long banquet table that ran the length of the gallery, 60 guests dined on a Thai feast prepared by sculptor Joe Wheaton, who has mastered the cuisine of coconut curries & peanut sauce, lemongrass & galangal, mango & papaya, and sticky rice & chilis on frequent travels to Southeast Asia with his partner, Dick Lipez (aka novelist Richard Stevenson, above). A longtime volunteer at St. Stephen’s Table, Wheaton cooked the entire multi-course meal, though many others—including St. Stephen’s Table coordinator Dan Moon, a culinary instructor at Taconic High School—helped dish it out. The evening raised more than $2,500 which will provide 50 nights of meals for those who would otherwise go hungry.

The evening was the Ferrin Gallery debut of North Adams artists Laura Christensen and her husband, Gregory Scheckler, who sold five of his landscapes at the opening; social worker Alba Passerini with the Ferrin Gallery's Donald Clark