WATER MILL, NY.- Parrish Art Museum Board of Trustees Chairman Frederic M. Seegal, and President H. Peter Haveles, Jr., have announced the recent appointment of four new members to the Board. Philanthropist Veronica Atkins, former arts executive and Hamptons real estate agent Cee Scott Brown, financial services consultant James L. Freeman, and former filmmaker Sandy Perlbinder were elected this spring.
“It is with great enthusiasm that I welcome these new Trustees,” says Seegal. “Each has unique expertise that will contribute immensely to the success of the Museum.”
According to Haveles, “I would like to congratulate not only the Trustees, but also the nominating committee for its hard work and judgment in enlisting these extraordinary candidates who each make the Parrish a stronger institution.”
“I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to work with these accomplished individuals,” says Parrish Art Museum Director Terrie Sultan. “Their passion for the Museum will have a profound impact on our overall mission.”
The Trustees
Veronica Atkins, a current managing director of The Metropolitan Opera, has been recognized as one of America’s most dedicated philanthropists. She is the chair of the Dr. Robert C. and Veronica Atkins Foundation, devoted to the prevention of disease through nutrition and lifestyle, and founded with her late husband, cardiologist Dr. Robert C. Atkins, who created the Atkins Lifestyle.
Atkins is the international chair and on the board of trustees of the International Society of Palm Beach, which distributes grants to charities that further the arts, education, and medicine. She is also a sustaining patron of the Palm Beach chapter of the American Red Cross. As a member of the Parrish Art Museum Board of Trustees, Atkins is interested in encouraging creative collaborations among the visual and performing arts, and supporting the Museum’s continued development as the center for cultural engagement for the East End.
Born in Russia, Veronica Atkins was trained as an opera singer and performed professionally in Europe from a young age. She has lived in seven countries and is fluent in as many languages. An avid gardener, Atkins and her late husband were drawn to the area’s natural setting and unique light more than thirty years ago, making Southampton their second home.
Sag Harbor resident Cee Scott Brown built a twenty-year career as an arts executive in New York, beginning in 1977 at The Museum of Modern Art Projects Program (renamed The Elaine Dannheisser Projects Series). Three years later, Brown was appointed director of the Holly Solomon Gallery, where he worked with leading non-traditional artists of the time. He was then named director of Creative Time, the pioneering organization that presented art in public venues, and later ran the Art Matters Foundation, spearheading the Art Matters Catalog.
Brown relocated to the East End in 1996, working in the real estate industry where he has been consistently recognized as a top producer. He was appointed to the Sag Harbor Historical Preservation and Architectural Review Board in 2003, and served as the chairman from 2006 through June, 2015. A Parrish Art Museum Member since 1997, Brown served on the committees for Landscape Pleasures (2003-2007) and Parrish Presents holiday benefit (2007-2012). As a Parrish Trustee, he will act as a liaison to the program advisory committee, and is eager to lend his experience in the art world and knowledge of the East End to support the Museum’s efforts to reach a broader audience.
James L. Freeman is the founder and chairman of the board of Freeman & Co., which has provided strategic advisory and management consulting to the financial services sector since 1991. Previously, Freeman had a distinguished career at CS First Boston, where he headed groups including Global Equities, Global Asset Management, Global Equity and Fixed Income Research, and Global Sales. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania with an M.B.A. from the Wharton School, Freeman has co-authored several books on investment banking including Investment Banking Handbook.
Freeman is a devoted and knowledgeable collector of American decorative arts and late 19th Century American paintings, which he has partially or fully gifted, or loaned to museums including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and George Washington’s Mount Vernon in Virginia. He has developed an interest in contemporary art, particularly drawings and prints. Freeman and his wife Laura Lofaro, a long-standing member of the board of trustees for the Museum of the City of New York, live in New York City, with a second home in the Hamptons.
Sandy Perlbinder’s extensive board experience includes Planned Parenthood of Suffolk County (now PPHP) where she successfully co-chaired a $3.5 million capital campaign, and was instrumental in starting the art committee’s successful “Art for Choice” auctions. She is currently a trustee of the LearningSpring School in New York, having joined the board in 2001. Perlbinder is vice chair of the Women’s Leadership Council of Stony Brook University, a mentoring program for outstanding female students, and serves on the advisory board of the Pollock-Krasner House in Springs.
Sandy Perlbinder and her husband Steve began their relationship with the Parrish in 2003, hosting a Landscape Pleasures event at their Sagaponack home. They were major contributors to the Parrish Capital Campaign and have been generous underwriters of exhibitions including Norman Jaffe, 2005; Herzog & de Meuron, 2007; Damaged Romanticism, 2009; Underground Pop, 2010; and Parrish Road Show, 2012, 2013, and 2014. For 2015, the Perlbinders have extended their support to Salon Series, Platform: Tara Donovan, and Parrish Road Show. As a member of the Parrish Board of Trustees, Sandy Perlbinder will act as a liaison to the program advisory committee and help to re-establish the Education Committee.
Sandy Perlbinder graduated from Barnard College with a B.A. in Art History, and attended Columbia University at the graduate level. She began her career as an actress prior to starting her own production company and creating award-winning commercials and films. The Perlbinders are avid collectors of contemporary art and maintain a lively interest in architecture, art, and classical music. They live both in New York and the East End, where they have maintained a second home since 1969.
