Abbott Handerson Thayer. George de Forest Brush. Joseph Lindon Smith. These are just a few of the preeminent American artists who began calling Dublin home around the turn of the 20th century. More than a century later, the Monadnock region continues to be a haven for artists, and 57 of them will welcome the public into their studios Columbus Day weekend.

Artists living and working in Dublin, Hancock, Jaffrey, Peterborough, Sharon, Marlborough and Harrisville will be at the Jaffrey Civic Center on Aug. 28 for an opening reception of the free art tour organized by Monadnock Art: Friends of the Dublin Art Colony. Calligraphy, woodworking, painting, basket weaving, jewelry making, sculpture, mosaics, textiles and more are among the works of art represented in this exhibit and tour. A full list of participating artists and a gallery of their selected works is available online at www.monadnockart.org.

Monadnock Art is a nonprofit organization Paul Tuller of Dublin founded 15 years ago with the goal of paying tribute to the artists who followed Abbott Handerson Thayer to Dublin, and to promote artists living in the area now. The recent focus of the member-based artists’ organization is its annual art tour, which draws 500 to 1,000 people every year during foliage season, Tuller said Monday.

“Columbus Day weekend has worked well for the last number of years,” he said, noting that the drive from studio to studio along the art tour route is a good way to see the area at its autumnal peak.

Discovering the past

Tuller said he developed an interest in Dublin’s artists of the past while living in the former Dublin home of Russian painter Gouri Ivanov-Rinov, who had moved to the area as a friend of Alexander James. James, nephew of famed American writer Henry James, and other artists had come to Dublin to assist Abbott Thayer in his art studio, or as friends of Thayer, Tuller said.

“It was like a chain of friends who came here. The first was Abbott Thayer,” Tuller said. “My whole research leads me to believe people came here for personal relationships.”

Thayer’s mother was a Keene native and Thayer, born in Boston, grew up in Keene and spent summers in Keene and Dublin as an adult in the 1880s. He moved to Dublin year round with his wife and children in 1901. His friend and fellow painter, George de Forest Brush, settled in Dublin around the same time. It was in the late 1880s that painter and archeological artist Joseph Lindon Smith also began summering in Dublin. They and other artists of their time began putting Dublin barns to use as art studios.

“They weren’t organized in anyway,” Tuller noted of the group that would later be known as members of the Dublin Art Colony.

Some of the descendants of these artists are still living or summering in Dublin and surrounding communities. Dublin painter Taylor Hale, who is in his 20s, recently painted a panel portrait of one of the colony’s founders, Smith, who is Hale’s great-great-grandfather. The panel has become part of The Park Theatre’s Fifth Mountain Mural, which depicts scenes from the Monadnock region and Mount Monadnock. Hale’s relation, Georgia Fletcher, 81, of Dublin, one of the art tour artists, is the granddaughter of Brush.

“They were all friends and the generations have all stayed friends,” Fletcher said Monday.

Fletcher will be exhibiting her paintings along with Tuller’s Japanese-inspired woodwork in his barn during the art tour. Even though there are 57 artists participating, there are just 50 stops on the tour so some of the artists are sharing space.

Tuller said of Fletcher, “She has the family touch.”

A family of artists

As a painter herself, it wasn’t always easy for Georgia Fletcher of Dublin to acknowledge that painter George de Forest Brush, one of the founders of the Dublin Art Colony, was her grandfather, Fletcher said Monday. That’s because she didn’t want it to appear as though she was riding on his success.

Brush, whose series of American Indian paintings were exhibited at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., from Sept. 2008 to Jan. 2009, spent time living out west with various Indian tribes, Tuller noted.

“They’re very striking and incredible,” he said of the series, noting that Brush also did a lot of portraiture.

Brush had the distinction of being highly paid for his paintings during his lifetime.

Fletcher, who was close with her grandfather, followed in his footsteps. He became the most important influence on her work, which included portraits, landscapes and sculpture.

The President’s Award from the American Artists Professional League of New York City, Outstanding Work Award from the Women’s National Juried Competition in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Juror’s Award from the Thorne-Sagendorph Art Gallery in Keene, First Prize for an oil painting from The Duxbury Arts Association in Duxbury, Mass., and the Wendle Corey Award from the Academic Artists Association of Springfield, Mass., are among Fletcher’s achievements.

About 10 years ago, Fletcher said, she finally became comfortable with people knowing her connection with Brush, though she doesn’t consider herself to be his equal.

“I was really lucky to be born in this family,” she said. “I just feel really proud that I’m his granddaughter and I’m a painter. ... I’m miles away from what he could do.”

Growing up, Fletcher spent a great deal of time with Brush, visiting him in Dublin and entertaining him when he visited her family in North Salem, N.Y., and later lived with them in Hanover. Fletcher discussed a painting Brush had done of her during one of his visits.

“It’s a very tiny painting. He was very old, but I treasure it. He painted me in a swing because I wouldn’t sit still. He paid me and he gave me a small purse to put [the money] in,” she said. “I have trouble getting my great-granddaughter to sit still, so I know what torture he went through with me.”

Like Fletcher, her great-granddaughter, Peyton Seaver, age 10, of Dublin said Monday she plans to pursue a career in the arts, as well.