A unique Sullivan County landmark is marking a major milestone.
The Church of the Little Green Man, an ongoing performance art project created by artist Mike Osterhout, will celebrate its 40th anniversary with a get-together on Saturday, June 13, at 5 p.m. at 145 Old Glen Wild Road in Glen Wild.
The project began in 1986 on the Lower East Side and East Village, where Osterhout said it grew out of a gathering of musicians, artists and other like-minded people living and working in the city.
“The Church of the Little Green Man is an ongoing performance art project,” Osterhout said. “We use the structure of kind of a Christian church service. We appropriate that as our basic structure and go from there.”
There is also one unusual admission requirement.
“You burn a dollar to get in,” Osterhout said. “That kind of sets the tone.”
The Church of the Little Green Man has continued on and off for four decades, eventually finding a home in Glen Wild. Osterhout said he moved to Sullivan County in 1995 and bought the church building and the house next door. At the time, he was working in New York City as a restoration carpenter while fixing up the buildings in Glen Wild.
It took about 15 years before the church services began again locally, he said.
“When that started in 2010, everything, the world had changed,” Osterhout said. “What I initially thought the church would be would be people coming out of the city, my community coming out of the city. But when you’re gone for 15 years, you don’t have much of a community in the city anymore.”
Instead, a new community formed in the Catskills.
Osterhout said many close friends eventually moved upstate and became part of the core congregation. Over time, the surrounding community changed as well.
“When I first came up, it was tumbledown bungalows and abandoned farms,” Osterhout said. “All of that has changed. So the crowd now is basically local, but it has a city edge to it. There’s a lot of transplants.”
Osterhout said the project has also changed as the people around it have changed. In its early days, the church was very much an adult venue, he said. While he said it still includes adult themes and adult language, families have become more present in the Catskills version of the project.
“That’s been the biggest change,” Osterhout said. “Kids are on board. And I always leave that up to the parents whether they want to bring their children or not.”
For Osterhout, part of the appeal is the way the church allows people to laugh at themselves and the world around them.
“Kids love to watch adults make fools of themselves,” he said. “That’s what we do at church. We basically make fools of ourselves and the world we find ourselves in.”
This year’s 40th anniversary gathering will have a Latin theme, which Osterhout said is meant as a gesture of welcome and support. He said the service will also include a “heal thyself” theme and a memorial for Dave Raven, a longtime congregant who died recently.
After the service, Osterhout said the gathering will continue with a barbecue, music and a party into the evening.
When people leave the anniversary gathering, Osterhout said he hopes they walk away with joy.
“When we’re singing off-color hymns and people are singing and dancing and the kids are running around, I look out to the congregation and it’s all smiles,” he said.
The 40th anniversary get-together for the Church of the Little Green Man takes place Saturday, June 13, at 5 p.m. at 145 Old Glen Wild Road in Glen Wild.
Osterhout said people can find more information by searching for the Church of the Little Green Man online or by visiting his Instagram account, @OldShul1.
Osterhout said. “Bring a dollar to burn.”