Could anyone tell me how the Cincinnati Summertime fair was last year? Wanted to apply but not sure if it is worth it.
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Could anyone tell me how the Cincinnati Summertime fair was last year? Wanted to apply but not sure if it is worth it.
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I'd like to revive this discussion and find out from others who may have done Cincinnati Summerfair more recently. What's your take on it now, 7-10 years later? (recognizing the lull from pandemic years, but still hoping for info more recent than 2012...)
I did it a couple of years in a row. The first I won an award. Sales were average. The layout is confusing, some spots near the river are prone to flooding. The volunteers are all helpful and overall it's a nice show. The weather can be spotty. Sales and traffic have both declined, as has the reported quality. Since winning an award there, I've not been able to get back in, and most of the fine artists I know have given up on it. I'm not sure how they are jurying the show now, but it seems as if it has been deliberately slanted more towards the craft side as Michelle points out.
As a Cincinnati resident who has gone to Summerfair almost every year since its inception, and who has volunteered at the show for several years -- but who has never exhibited there myself, although I'm thinking about it for this year -- I can tell you a bit about this show.
Some of the jury members change each year, yet there's still a high percentage of returning artists, to the point that the show can get boring for the customers. I stopped going for about 3 years in the early 2000s because I saw the same artists every year and too many of them were still producing the same designs they were the year before. After that the show seemed to get more diversity, maybe because as Jim says many of the artists had given up. Yes, there are more fine craft exhibitors now, but these are on a much higher quality level than the craftspeople you'd find at a good "craft show." And the fine art still easily outnumbers the fine craft.
The attendance at Summerfair is better by far than other shows in the area. Cincinnati is overrun with art and craft shows and the saturation has started to affect attendance and sales. But since Summerfair is still considered the city's premier show, if people who love art are going to attend only one show a year it will be Summerfair.
Too much yard art? Yeah, there are usually a few metal-on-a-stick guys, but that's not a bad number out of, what, 250 booths? Plus, there's some metal "yard art" that goes for $2K, so that's not too tacky. There's a lot of 2D art of all kinds and photography, plus a fair amount of fiber, of course jewelry, wood, and blown glass. I've always thought there's a pretty good diversity of media. Back when Summerfair was strictly high-end fine art, there were many people who went to browse but never even considered being able to afford anything. Now there's more of a price range, with still plenty of high end, so I think its reputation has changed a bit away from browsing-only and more toward actually buying. What a concept! At $350 or thereabouts it's still a pretty good value as compared to a lot of art fairs who price their booths much higher.
The volunteer staff is always friendly and eager to help. Some of the paid staff could use some attitude adjustment in terms of viewing the artists as their customers, but unfortunately that's not any different than a lot of the shows' staffs.
The show is in the Coney Island park, which used to be an amusement park until the rides were moved to a new amusement park (King's Island) north of Cincinnati. So the concrete walking paths are indeed winding and kinda confusing, but they do give out maps and most shoppers cross off sections on the map as they go, then circle back later to catch the areas they missed. At this same park location is Moonlight Gardens where they used to hold dances in the '40s and Sunlight pool, which is like the largest pool in the country or something like that. Riverbend is also right there, which is a popular outdoor performance venue that hosts top line music acts. So my point to all of this is to say that for many reasons the location of Summerfair is considered a treasured place for Cincinnatians, and the art fair gives them a good excuse to visit this very cool place.
Set-up starts around noon the day before and goes until dark. You can drive on those paved walkways, so load-in and -out is easy. Parking is close by -- the artists get the closest spots, not the farthest-away spots! -- and there's a ton of room for RVs
And yes, there are many conservative republicans in Cincinnati, but the city is not nearly as conservative as the reputation leads you to believe. All the big companies in town have brought in plenty of transplants over the years to make Cincinnati much like other midwestern cities. And our Contemporary Art Center did put on the Mapplethorpe exhibit (of course the county sheriff shut it down but a LOT of people attended and loved it before he locked the doors), and the CAC's new digs were designed by Zaha Hadid, And how can a place that produced George Clooney be anything but super cool? Just kidding, relax.
Warning: The jury members absolutely want to see NEW images from you each year. So Jim, if you or other artists didn't get into the show again it could be because you/they used photos from the previous year. I don't get this, because if your photos are still representative of your work, why not use them? But this jury gets frustrated (bored? offended?) by re-used images and immediately tosses the artist out. Also, although I'm told it's absolutely a blind jurying system, most Cincinnati artists believe that the show favors out-of-town artists and that the bar is set higher for in-towners.
What else would be helpful for you to know about Summerfair?
Good to know, although I have been sending a new crop of images every year for the past three or four years. Never get in. Last year, I didn't bother. The sales reports from the people I know who've done the show describe a dismal death spiral for sales.
It's good to have your insider's report, though. Thorough and generally positive, which gives me hope. Thank you!
When I can get into most (not all, but working on it) of the top twenty-five shows in the country, yet get rejected from the same second tier shows year after year, I always wonder what's going on. Usually it's some local predilection against photography, or a like for certain avante garde styling, or other quirks. Sometimes it's just not a good fit for me.
So... what about the reported b/s that took a big prize at this show? How is that type of situation policed?
BigO - I don't know about the prize for a reseller. I remember hearing about that disappointment several months ago, but I thought that happened at a Florida show. I really don't recall seeing buy/sell at Summerfair in the past, however a) I wasn't specifically looking for it and b) I was skipping booths that didn't interest me so b/s could've been there and I missed it.