In celebration of our 55th anniversary, actor and educator Kathryn Chesley will portray artist Martha Hartman, and there will be an auction for one of Hartman's paintings.

Martha and her husband William Hartman founded The Hartman School of Art in Sarasota in 1951. However, Martha is best known for founding the famed Sarasota Petticoat Painters in 1953, which is the oldest continuously exhibiting women’s art group in the United States. In her Life and Times, Kathryn Chesley  tells the story of the development of all the arts in Sarasota County with references to the men and women who helped to create the cultural coast of Florida.