LAKELAND, FLA.- “American Impressionism: The Lure of the Artists’ Colony,” opened at the Polk Museum of Art on Dec. 9 and runs through Feb. 18, 2017.

This comprehensive exhibition features one of the Reading Public Museum’s greatest strengths – its collection of works by American Impressionists.

The exhibition includes more than 100 works, including more than 80 oil paintings and nearly 30 works on paper dating from the 1880s through the 1940s. Landscapes that range from snow-covered hills to sun-filled harbors, seascapes, portraits, and remarkable still life works imbued with rich textures reveal the artists’ interest in capturing effects of light and atmosphere in their work.

The exhibition is arranged according to the artists’ colonies that played a critical role in the development of American Impressionism, including those at Cos Cob and Old Lyme in Connecticut; Cape Cod, Cape Ann, and Rockport in Massachusetts; New Hope and Philadelphia in Pennsylvania; Taos, New Mexico; and California.

This exhibition also examines American expatriate artists such as Mary Cassatt and John Singer Sargent. Other leading artists of the movement include William Merritt Chase, Childe Hassam, Ernest Lawson, Julian Alden Weir, John Twachtman, Chauncey Ryder, Frank W. Benson, William Paxton, Abbott Thayer, Guy Wiggins, Charles Webster Hawthorne, Colin Campbell Cooper, Daniel Garber and Edward Redfield.