The Other October Show

While I was deciding what to put in the photography show at the St Michaels Library, I was also working on another show that will be at the Easton Library.

The Easton show is called "Celebrate the Arts" and is being jointly sponsored by the St Michaels Art League and the Talbot County Arts Council (TCAC). This show is celebrating 50 years of the Maryland State Arts Council (MSAC) and 40 years of TCAC. Our local council gets its funding from the state and in the past 40 years has received millions of dollars for local art programs.

Oh yeah, I forgot to say, I am on the committee...and have been working for several months to get artists registered for the show. We invited anyone who lives, works, shows or sells art in Talbot County to participate.

We had a cut off number of 70 artists and, by the registration deadline, we had a wait list of 9! For the past several days one of our committee members has been trying to secure extra hangers and hooks so we can display everyone's art. Fingers crossed that we really will be able to hang all the artwork.

Next Monday is October 1st. We will be welcoming the 79 registered artists at the library and begin to hang the show that day. On Friday, the 5th we are having a reception for the entire community to celebrate with us. The show will hang for the month of October.

The range of artistic talent and wealth of imagination in our area is amazing. We anticipate an incredible show!

Oh, forgot to say, I am entering my latest ropes painting. "Knots on the Dock." Come see it in person!

Veggies...

Many years ago - just after the turn of the century - (doesn't that sound strange? it was probably 15 years ago), I challenged myself by 'promising' that whenever the art league had an exhibition/show I would enter at least one thing.

That pledge has been a good incentive for me. Most of our shows have been specific themes - which are always fun challenges - or art that I have been working on already. There was a time a few years ago when we had an Oil and Acrylic Only (OAAO) show - I do neither of these things. But, I made myself try some acrylic and it turned out OK.

Now we come to this fall. For the first time, the art league is promoting a Photography Only show. Everyone takes pictures. Most of us use them as references for our paintings. True confession time...of the more than 30,000 photos on my computer, most of them are of my grandchildren! Many of them I have painted, but they are not fine art photography.

I began looking through other files and discovered one that I had labeled 'Veggies.' My son, an organic farmer, has had beautiful displays of veggies at the farmer's market during the summers. I picked out a few of old pictures to play with.

Here is a box of tomatoes - ready for market. I am calling it "One turned over"

I also found a wonderful bunch of carrots.

That's a lot of carrots, but the photo wasn't very sharp. I don't know much about Photoshop, but I thought I would see if I could make it clearer. Well, that didn't work (I need to take a class), so I started to play with filters or something... I decided to go for texture and ended up with this. 

I'm definitely not going for 'fine art' photography, but I did have fun... and besides, the folks who do really great photography don't have to worry about me taking any prize money away from them! 

It was fun and a good challenge!

The show will be hanging at the St Michaels Library during the month of October.