ART SHOWS GALORE!!! - Part 1

My painting at the top - not sure who was the other winner here, but it was a great painting also!

SOUTHEASTERN INDIANA ART GUILD SHOW
The reception was held on Saturday, April 25 at the SIAG studios – corner of 2nd and Main in Aurora, IN.
The SIAG partners with several florists in the area who come in before the show opening and pick several paintings to create companion pieces for. This was a large show, well attended, and quite beautiful with the lovely floral arrangements scattered throughout.
The show was juried by Sam Hollingsworth, an artist from Northern Kentucky, who is also in our GCWS group. The work was divided into several groups (pastel, oil, watercolor, acrylic, colored pencil, etc.) and a 1st, 2nd and 3rd place award was given for each category as well as some purchase awards. Some of the winners have greatly improved their skills since I’ve known them and it made me happy to see them rewarded for their hard work. I was also happy that one of my pieces won a 3rd place award and one of my watercolors won 1st Place – Best of Show!

GCWS SHOW
Our show opened Sunday, April 26 with a lovely reception provided by Evergreen. The paintings looked great, having been hung by our hardworking hanging committee headed up by Mary Jane who was assisted by Tamara, Jo, Ron, Kathy and Joan.

Tamara and Mary Jane doing their job hanging the paintings.

Jenny (from Evergreen on the left) and Carol and Jane helping with registration - and having WAY too much fun!

Since this was our 7th annual exhibit we had a theme of 7 and most of the artists were able to keep with the theme – some by including a “7” in their prices, some with their titles, and some with their content.

Marilyn Bishop (http://marilynsartblog.blogspot.com) had the idea of playing a game – visitors looked for 7 paintings that incorporated the theme and then wrote down how the artist had incorporated the idea of 7 into their painting. When they dropped off their papers they won a notecard for participating! Some of the folks really got into the search!
For those of you in the Greater Cincinnati area, the show runs through May 31 at Evergreen Retirement Community, 230 W. Galbraith Road. You can see the show any day – enter at the red awning with our banner hanging and just wander through – this place is gorgeous!!! The paintings are all located on the first floor. Hopefully you will see something you would like to purchase!
On the weekends (noon – 4:00 p.m.) we will be having some of our member artists painting, so it might be fun to drop by then to watch and learn. Check out that information under “Shows” on the right side of my blog.

On a personal note, one of the visitors to the show was someone I grew up with, we had not seen each other for probably 42 or 43 years, and we recognized each other! (Not really sure what that says about us – either we look young now or we looked really, really old as kids!!!) Seriously, it was so cool!

The harpist for the day was Nancy Bick Clark - she not only can play the harp but has a lovely voice and serenaded us several times that day!