Workwise, Josh Scott is an ultra-marathoner. On a sunny, brisk spring morning, the arborist and owner of Beetlebung Tree Care walks around a spectacular 70-acre property on Squibnocket Pond with caretaker Tim Rich. Visually, they are quite a pair. Tim is tall, maybe six-six with a long, lumbering stride while Josh has the wiry build and nimble movements of a runner.
It was a long and busy summer at Beetlebung Farm in Chilmark, and on Sunday night farm workers traded vegetable beds for guitars and poems at what was billed as the Beetlebung Festival of the Arts and Edibles at the Chilmark Community Center.
Farm owner and chef Chris Fischer made farm-raised pork meatballs, green salad, kale Caesar, broiled greens with crispy pork and ribolita, a Tuscan bean and kale salad. Chilmark Coffee company owner Todd Christy brewed fresh cups of Vineyard-ground coffee and tea to order.
The Chilmark Library is presenting an exhibition of paintings by Carol Barsha. There will be an opening reception held on Saturday, July 23 from 3 to 5 p.m.
Ms. Barsha’s exhibit is called Twenty Years at Beetlebung Farm. Her work chronicles her time spent painting at the farm for a few weeks every summer from 1998 to 2008.
Ms. Barsha’s primary medium is oils. Her attention, while at Beetlebung Farm, was turned toward its “fields and gardens, specifically, rows of plants and flowers and the fences that contain them.”
On a recent afternoon, when the skies had finally cleared and the earth was beginning to soak up five days worth of rain, Marie Scott emerged out of her field off Middle Road in Chilmark. Barefoot, she appeared to float effortlessly amongst her crops. Her feet squished in the damp ground as she showed the Gazette around the land she has been connected to her entire life off Beetlebung Corner, aptly named Beetlebung Farm.
