A recognized master in the medium of graphite, David will surprise you with what is possible using only a pencil. On his technique, David explains, "While many artists draw with an emphasis on lines, I use light and shadow-contrast-to delineate surfaces, much like a painter uses color. In that respect, my approach to drawing is more like painting."
"Cloud Gate", two cradled Claybord™ panels, 30" x 10" and 30" x 30"
Discovering in junior high that he wanted to be an artist, he has spent the intervening years exploring many media and has been able to make his youthful dream come true. Growing up in Oregon he spent many years as the senior photographer for Harry & David and the Jackson & Perkins mail order catalogs. So chances are pretty good you have seen his photos!
He says, "It was a great job that I loved very much but my passion always lay with drawing. In fact, the photography supported me while I began my art career and allowed me to, fifteen years ago, turn my attention to becoming a full-time artist and I've never looked back!"
Coming to the art fairs about five years ago with his drawings he says this is the best and most risky decision he has ever made. He has embraced the lifestyle wholeheartedly and the shows and the patrons have reinforced his choice. Mainly traveling the Western events from Washington to Texas he is piling up awards and is enthusiastic about his "new" career.
See him in April in The Woodlands Waterway Arts Festival near Houston and at the Main Street Fort Worth Arts Festival.
I have been approached at several of the shows I have done recently by gallery owners asking me about wholesale prices for putting my work in their gallery and additionally asked about selling my work on consignment. I know most want a sizable discount...which is somewhat understandable.
My 1st. question to anyone who does wholesale your work ...or send it to galleries on consignment is what type of positive and negative results have you experienced?
If you send it to a gallery on consignment what is a reasonable time to leave it in the gallery to be sold or when should you decide it is time to remove it?
If it is an out-of-town gallery what expectations should you have from the gallery to ship it back to you if not sold in a reasonable amount of time?
What type of contracts/agreements should be expected between you and the gallery?
What is considered a fair and reasonable commission or wholesale discount?
I realize these are alot of questions, many of which might have possible been discussed before...but I haven'y been able to locate the discussions.
As Florida residents my wife and I do shows here from Oct to May with the exception of the One of A Kind in Chicago. The fall season is always a mixed bag. This year Jan shows were up for us over the previous 2 years, this trend continued into Feb. We had our best Mt Dora ever followed by a good show in Estero. Then it seemed the bottom kind of dropped out here. We had a series of poor shows in Sarasota, Venice, Bonita Springs and Naples. Hopefully upcoming events in Delray Beach, Melbourne and Lakeland are much better. Otherwise we are really looking forward to heading north in June for some summer shows. Best of luck to all of us out there trying to get by in a tough time.
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Wise words from one of social media's most listened to people, Seth Godin:
then you've handed control over your happiness to the gatekeepers, built a system that doesn't scale and prevented yourself from the brave work that leads to a quantum leap.
The industrial system (and the marketing regime) adore the mindset of 'a little bit more, please', because it furthers their power. A slightly higher paycheck, a slightly more famous college, an incrementally better car--it's easy to be seduced by this safe, stepwise progress, and if marketers and bosses can make you feel dissatisfied at every step along the way, even better for them.
Their rules, their increments, and you are always on a treadmill, unhappy today, imagining that the answer lies just over the next hill...
All the data shows us that the people on that hill are just as frustrated as the people on your hill. It demonstrates that the people at that college are just as envious as the people at this college. The never ending cycle (no surprise) never ends.
An alternative is to be happy wherever you are, with whatever you've got, but always hungry for the thrill of creating art, of being missed if you're gone and most of all, doing important work.
For those of you who may not be keeping accurate records of all your credit card transactions, be aware that your credit card processor is sending the IRS a form containing all your gross sales at the end of the year starting with 2011.
Well, Englewood always presents lots of options for good food and drinking, been doing it for over 10 years, so I know the area well.
Just so you know, Englewood is just south of Venice,Florida with Boca grande just a mosquito's flight down the road.
You are surrounded by waters here, sounds, creeks, rivers and the Gulf. Lots of seafood around, lots of places to tipple and have a cool one at.
Let me tell you about some of my favorites.
If you just want to have cold one and enjoy the view, head out the causeway to Englewood Beach. Across from the Gulf when you turn south is the White Elephant Bar and Restaurant.
It is rambling place with three bars and live music at night. Nothing fancy, but they give you a fair pour at a very reasonable price. Had Makers Mark on the rocks for under $6.50 along with a cold one. Nice view out over the harbor with large sailboats berthed here and there.
For really good seafood and a nice environment you can't beat Farlows on the water. It is one of the best restaurants there. Owned by a husband and wife team, he being from St. Croix, USVI (hence all the emphasis on yummy fish baked and sautéed with good veggies and fruits and peppers. His wife from Louisville brings in a lot of good Kentucky fare like a hot brown sandwich.)
They have items like, flounder w/crabmeat for $14 on up to fish of the day baked in good stuff for $24. They do a mean top round steak that is marinated in vinegar and honey for $14 and it will melt in your mouth. They have sushi-grade tuna and lots of fun appetizers. They carry a fully stocked bar with an expert bartender who makes plentiful libations at very reasonable prices. Try the mojitos made with homegrown mint, it is a winner. This place was good enough, that I ate there two nites in a row.
Down the road, route 775 which heads you to Gasparilla Island, home of Boca Grande, lies a quaint little seafood village community called Placida.
They have great seafood restaurant there called the Fishery owned by Gary Allbritton and married to Margaret who has a cool gallery there. Margaret was a major force on our circuit in the 70's and 80's.
Again this is old-time Florida. It is the real deal, nothing fancy, but all yummy.
They sit right on the water which offers a great view at sunset.
The image I used for this blog was taken last year at twilight right behind the restaurant.
Here you are going to get great fresh fish, hushpuppies and all the usual trimmings. It is worth the twenty minute ride down to it. If even that.
As Nancy pointed out, the Myakka Fish Camp restaurant bar is great local favorite. The prices are right, the beer is always cold, and you get a great view on the river. Heck a gator might pull up beside you with a cooter to trade for one of your hush-puppies. Just kidding folks, no gators are going to pester you.
Sunday morning for breakfast head to Stephanos just up the highway from the art show. Enjoy a leisurely omelet or a morning riser while perusing the local paper, or go big time beforehand, and go to the Publix and buy the New York Times, that will give you serious reading pleasure for hours-end and then you will still have the crossword puzzle. A great way to start the day before the show opens at 10 AM.
Just to be fair, I could not locate the Placida jpeg I wanted, so I have used this image of the sunset on Englewood Beach almost across from the White Elephant. There, I have "certified" it.
Last year before I did Laumeier the area hit by flood and tornado a month before the show. Let said the crowd was very low according to another artist. I asking how you believe that will affect the upcoming shows in the area. I know is Texas and is bond to happen but I wont anyone going through that pain. Why can they just stay in area that wont hurt anyone.
Booth Fee: $35 Jury Fee on Zapp, $535 Booth Fee, $75 of the booth fee pre-pays the Tempe Business License and taxes, an Arizona License euphuistically referred to as the Transaction Privilege Tax (TPT)/License is also required. I checked on the City of Tempe Business web site and a special events license is only $25 which suggests that the other $50 is pre-collected taxes! If your sales don't meet or exceed that amount will they refund the difference? Inquiring minds want to know and I intend to check into that!
Logistics: Artists are not allowed into the festival area until 9 pm on Thursday the night before, although you can load-in early in the morning on Friday, the first day of the show. The festival does a really good job of organizing times for different "zones" to load-in. They are staggered on a half-hour basis and they make sure east-west and north-south artists go in the right direction on the street. Mill AVenue, which runs N/S is more narrow and load-in/out seems to be a little tight. Even so by 11:30 pm we were ready to sleep after driving 7+ hours to get there. Given the day light hours are longer now there was still light when we loaded up Sunday night, not so in December!
Show Hours: The show runs from 10-6 Friday-Sunday. It could have easily closed an hour earlier on Sunday without any loss.
Amenities: Tempe festival does a nice job of offering water, coffee, hot chocolate, sweets, treats and other stuff for the artists at their hospitality booth. At check in on Thursday they had water and what was left of the cookies (I should'a been there earlier!) Friday was fairly warm and the temperature reached close to 90 on Saturday and they were running around in the golf carts making sure all the artists had plenty of water! They have always been very friendly and hospitable. Booth sitters were available if needed by calling a number on the daily info sheet and they even offered a service to help people carry heavy art to their vehicles.
Demographics: Unlike ALL of the other shows that I have done in Arizona this winter season this show actually had a wide cross-section of age groups! The winter show had a LOT of baby strollers whereas this show had all age groups reasonably represented. Who was buying? People with money to spend of course! That seemed to be more of the middle age bracket with the high end age group buying more popcorn and the low end age group inexpensive art reprints.
Food: I know that there were some food booths on one of the streets but I didn't make it there this go round. I saw some people eating chocolate covered bananas and apples along with boxes of Asian noodles as-well-as the usual lemonade and popcorn stands. Given that the show takes place in downtown Tempe there are LOTS of restaurants around. We went for the Fatburger one day and the philly cheese steak another day at one of the local establishments. Dinner was a variety of salads, hummus and pita at a mid-eastern style restaurant Friday night.
Reflections: The booth fee seems a might high given the return at this show. Statistics provided by the show reveal that sponsorship pays for 23% of the expenses of the overall show which saves artists $200 on their booth fee. Artists and other vendor fees pay for 63% of the show ($330,000 total show cost). I had heard from artists last year that their results at the spring show were much better than what they experienced at the December show which is why I thought I'd try it. The show proudly boasts: "The Tempe Festival of the Arts consistently ranks among the Top 200 art festivals in the nation by Sunshine Artist and has received the Pinnacle Award from the International Festival and Events Association. The spring and fall events each attract nearly 225,000 visitors to the Mill Avenue District over the course of a 3-day weekend." I don't dispute the number of visitors as the show was pretty crowded each midday but how does Sunshine Artist come up with their rankings? Even the jewelers weren't doing so hot at the show this go round!
The festival has a "featured artist" for each of their shows which is a nice aspect. I have no idea how the artist is chosen for that honor but they get a double wide booth in the middle of the show. I first saw this shows featured artist work at a Costco in the Denver area with a representative manning the display. Subsequently his booth has been seen in many (most) of the shows in the southwest that I have attended, again with a representative, but never, prior to this, have I seen him. In fact I didn't see him in his booth last Dec at this show! He was there for this show though. Okay, enough sniping.
As mentioned the crowds were fairly large, even Friday there was a good herd marching through the streets. I like the TV show "Walking Dead" and minus the rotting flesh, biting of throats and moaning it seemed like the crowd moved through the show in a manner similar to the herd of dead on the show. The weather was so hot on Friday and Saturday that the lemonade stands were doing a brisk business but the popcorn wasn't going as fast! He reported that his numbers were pretty far off. Very little buying was taking place on either of the first two days for anyone except the hat people. I didn't even see a lot of dogs wearing the dog hats like I usually do. We held out hope that with the cooler temperatures on Sunday the buyers would come out. Sunday was much cooler, pleasantly so, although much breezier. I was encouraged about sales when I made my first early in the day but it slowed through the rest of the day. My neighbor Rick and his wife Linda were selling their very clever wood work items on a more regular basis like they did at the Dec show but the jeweler next to them was lamenting the lack of buying enthusiasm for her wares even though they seemed well priced. The hat people had brisk action throughout the weekend with items under $40. On Sunday as well it seemed like the majority of people just breezed past the booths without much interest. Is that just my perception? Is it germane to a big show? At the smaller shows that I have been doing it seems most everyone looks at most every booth.
Did I mention Buy/Sell (aka B/S)? The show makes a strong point in their daily newsletter that should an artist feel that they suspect B/S they can make an anonymous call and the staff will investigate it. I didn't get a chance to walk the show this time but the hat people seemed suspicious to me. Somehow their wares just didn't seem to have that hand-made quality. Who am I to judge, I didn't make any calls to anyone though.
The show went till 6 pm and although the weather wasn't as much of a factor by that time, the crowds thinned considerably by 5. In my comments to the organizers I know I will suggest ending the show at 5 on Sunday for sure. They came, they talked with the artists but they didn't buy much! This is definitely a show where a variety of price points in your booth will help get sales. I did see some very large items with legs but that was the exception. I saw a variety of yard art go by and the guy that paints very bright and clever images on old windows seemed to do well. So it seemed that "fun" things did well.
Smoke. Forest fire smoke. And then the wind died down and all was good.
Several of our machines were were just upgraded and refurbished, so timing was perfect AND a sixth machine became available. YEA!
With a team of five, we loaded, lugged, pushed, pulled and dragged the gear into position. Up stairs and elevators, across the red carpet, and up more stairs! Three of the machines were relocated to take advantage of the fickle breeze.
I've been blogging about the seven Florida art fairs I participated in during February and March as part of a winter circuit by this artist from the Midwest. My goal was to establish a market for my art in Florida so I could count on some sales and profits during the winter months in the future. Unfortunately I was not able to reach that goal. I did some math and the numbers show that the only thing I accomplished was a pretty good tan. I would have been better off staying home.
Booth fees and application fees cost me $3600, Gas 1200, Booth improvements 350, Parking 150 and Hotels were 2500. Total expenses came to $7800 (not counting food and incidentals).
Total sales for the seven art fairs was $11,000 which gave me a gross profit of $3200. Not much for two months out of the studio, especially when the cost of materials and framing are taken into account.
Of the seven art fairs I participated in (Artfest Ft Myers, Naples National, Coconut Grove, Bonita Springs, Las Olas, Winter Park and Naples Downtown), the only one that was financially worthwhile for me was Winter Park where I grossed $4700 in sales. I averaged only about $1100 in sales at the other six events. Winter Park saved me from a total disaster.
Another thing that saved me was my sympathetic friends in Naples who put me up for much of the time I spent in Florida. Without them my hotel bills would have been much higher.
Many artists I ran into during my "circuit", did much better than I did. Many did about the same or worse. So, its hard for me to make a generalization, except to say that Florida is not my market. For others, that might not be the case. But some things are apparent to me. There are too many art fairs in Southern Florida. The market is saturated. there are not enough buyers for all the artists who naively flock to the sunshine state with dollar signs in their eyes (me included). And I can't blame the promoters and organizers. As long as the artists keep paying the application and booth fees, the promoters will keep launching new art fairs. After all, it's a business and its profitable for them.
For me, I'm still licking my wounds and trying to find the dollars in my dwindling bank account for Spring and Summer booth fees in the Midwest. As for my future in Florida? There's Winter Park, but it tough to travel all that way for one show. And there's no guarantee of getting into this worthwhile show two years in a row.
Encouraged by the conversation there we added a poll to the site to take the temperature of attitudes on this idea. Here are the results:
As I look at the choices on the poll I think it was pretty much written to skew to the negative. Perhaps the topic should have been: Do you think buy/sell is a serious issue and do you think it should be addressed?
I'm having a bit of a quandary that I could use some help with. Like a lot of art fair artisans, I have an Etsy shop that I like to sell my work in online. And I have slowly (VERY slowly) been accumulating the necessary tools and accessories to start participating in fairs and festivals. I bought a good solid tent, I have some display mechanisms for inside it, and I even bought an iPad so I could get Square cheaply, and thus be independent and swipe my credit cards on my own.
Over the years (yes, it's now been years I've been preparing for this endeavor) I've created my body of work and accumulated stock. I've also slowly whittled away at that same collection as I sold pieces on Etsy, so it's been an interesting challenge to create new items and make them available for sale and at the same time accumulate enough work to be a viable vendor at a street fair experience. I don't think I'll ever have enough, quite frankly.
But my quandary comes with how I categorize my work when I'm considering applying to different art fairs and festivals. My work is already difficult to define as it's what I consider "wearable art", not a category that most traditional art festivals consider a viable or legitimate mode of expression. At least in the sense that they're looking for art that is hangable on a wall or displayable on a stand--paintings, photography, sculpture, ceramics, and mixed media. It's when an art festival starts cracking that hard shell and starts "allowing" wearable art in the door that things suddenly seem to start to get "crafty" and less "arty". Suddenly you have vendors with mass produced items from China saying, "Our stuff is wearable art, too!" and things degenerate rapidly...
Now, I understand that this is wrapped up in the debate around the definitions of Art and Craft, and that we won't solve that here. But it seems to me that most traditional art festivals that require an online application process don't really want wearable art in their festivals. I can understand why--it's a lot easier to define "Fine Art" and recognize it when it's following a set of traditional parameters that have always been used before. Clothing and jewelry are very utilitarian, an aspect that muddies the waters when it comes to determining whether it's "art" or not. How does one determine whether a piece of clothing is artistic or not? Is it in the execution or process? The end result? Its uniqueness? Its materials?
I've struggled with this for a long while. I consider my pieces wearable art, but others would look at them as simple costume pieces, not necessarily worthy of consideration in a more upscale art festival or fair that requires jurying. Even though each piece is individually hand made and one-of-a-kind with no duplications, they might consider my pieces too "crafty" in comparison to the paintings and photography that is the vast majority of what is submitted. I have boldly trudged forward, refusing to acknowledge a philosophical difference and stubbornly insisting that my work is not craft as much as it is art of a wearable nature. But just because I believe it's so doesn't make it so in the eyes of festival organizers, nor jurors considering applications.
As a consequence, I've considered making my work more "sculptural" in nature by supplying display mechanisms for the home that (in essence) help ground my pieces more as small sculptures for looking at rather than actually wearing. This puts them more into a soft sculpture category (like stuffed fabric birds, for example), and still provides an option for the purchaser to actually wear the piece if they desire.
So my question is (finally, after all this setup and rambling) is there really a "stratification" in the art festival world that doesn't allow wearable art or jewelry? I've attended my local ArtWalk here in San Diego, and they don't accept wearable art entries. And conversely I've been to the Carlsbad Village Street Faire (claiming to be the largest single-day street fair in the nation and making the statement that they are not an Arts and Crafts fair), and they pretty much accept anyone. I don't think my items can sell at a come-one-and-all street fair--my pieces are too "high end".
Are there differences between the terms "Art Festival" and "Street Fair" even though so many events seem to blur the line? For example, my local neighborhood event, The North Park Festival of the Arts, requires a jury application, but there's little difference in the event's end result than that of the Carlsbad Street Faire except scale.
How on earth do I find the right kinds of festivals and fairs for my work? Should I be looking for applications that specifically say "Craft Fair"? "Fiber Art"? "Wearable Art"? Should I expand my personal artistic expression into garments that are even more artistic and less utilitarian in order to be considered more traditional? Essentially creating paintings that happen to be on clothing?
Or is it just plain jitters on my part or a lack of hubris that compels me to think that my stuff is somehow an exception to the rules, and I must realize that my work is simply more appropriate to niche fairs and festivals that don't necessarily require online applications? That the higher end fairs are simply not for my kind of work, and I must make due with selling over-priced pieces (in comparison to everyone else) at venues that aren't focused on the kind of work I do?
Bit of an identity crisis here. I'd love some advice from those that have been around for a while in this industry. Ultimately, I don't want to embarrass myself by setting my work up in a venue that isn't appropriate.
I know many of you here use Priceline to get hotel rooms. Have any of you used the Price chop on Priceline? A few days ago I booked a room in Nashville, TN. I spent a lot of time checking room reviews and I saw that many of the hotels were completely booked. After a good hour of trying the name your own price and failing to get a room, I did the Price chop.
After driving for 9 hours, and through several hard down pours, we finally pulled up to our hotel in Nashville. It was after midnight and we were so tired. The receptionist said she hadn't received any reservation in our name and they were booked solid! I was very unhappy!!! I produced the paper work that I printed off the computer showing her I did indeed have reservations. She told me that they had run out of rooms a day before we even placed that reservation. We were left to try to figure out what to do to get another room during a time when so many events were taking place and the hotels were full to capacity.
The receptionist started calling around for us (which I appreciated) and we had to take a room at a Best Western (I would call it a "tired" Western). For many years we were living under a super tight budget and we had to take crappy rooms because they were cheaper and we needed to save money. I have reached my limit for doing that and try to get a nice room that I don't have to worry how old and filthy the carpet is, or think about how long ago the bedspread was washed.
Has this happened to any of you? I thought Priceline guaranteed their rooms. This has now happened to us 2 times in Nashville. I might think it was the hotel's fault except I have experienced this with 2 different hotels in the same city. Have any of you contacted Priceline with a problem before? I will be calling them tomorrow and through the magic of the internet (Facebook, google+, Twitter, AFI) people will know about it if I am not compensated in some way. The social media is a great way to spread bad PR for companies if they fail to do what they advertise. It can also be used to show appreciation for good companies, as well.
I found this at the bottom of their opening page - With our Best Price Guarantee, you can be sure you're getting the lowest rate at top-notch hotels - even at the last minute.
September 15 & 16 Marine on St. Croix, Minnesota Historic rivertown on the St. Croix River 10am-5pm 175 artists and craftspeople Deadline: April 15 or till full
Award winning, well established show with quality art and craft.
Beautiful setting outdoors
easy set-up, no pets
Fall leaf looking ten minutes north of Stillwater, 40 min. from Minneapolis
All profits go to our Public Safety Department.
Extensive advertising of the art fair is planned this year.
This is an outdoor event that has the reputation of being an outstanding art fair. It is always held the 3rd weekend of September, the peak of our fall colors tourist season. Marine on St. Croix is located in Northern Washington County, eleven miles north of Stillwater and seventeen miles south of Taylors Falls on Highway 95 at County Road 4.
You may think that I have it out for Madison “On the Square.” I don’t, and it may only look that way. I have always loved that show. However, they keep making these decisions that are questionable at best and are at worst are illegal.
Now, the latest decision is they have made is to charge an additional fee on top of the booth fee if an accepted artist wants to pay by credit card. The fee is $20 for a double booth and $10 for a single booth. I am not a lawyer but I am somewhat familiar with credit card fees. As I understand this, it may not be illegal to charge the fee, but all the major credit card companies have clauses in their contracts that do not allow for this fee to be charged. They have that fee so that people will use credit cards instead of paying cash or using personal checks. This sounds to be like an illegal practice. And that is only my opinion. In addition, they could get away with it, if they told artists that they would give them a $10 or $20 discount is they paid in cash, but the Madison “Art Fair on the Square” is making it a penalty to pay by credit card.
I hope that artists will question this practice and put a stop to this.
I am going to forward this to Annik Dupaty, the Madison, AFOS, Director of Events and see what her response is.
I do come up with the same conclusion that I did for the jury blog I posted earlier in the week. JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN DOESN’T MEAN THAT YOU SHOULD. And I’m not even sure that it applies if it is an illegal fee. And again it appears as if Annik is more concerned with the bottom line than the ethical running of an organization.
Well my last show in the Southeast until fall... I love the fact that the Gilmores have an all day set up at their shows. Even though they are not present, they post the space listings on the office with a vendor list and booth number along with a note that says "feel free to set up." It just makes life so much easier and you do not feel rushed.Today is the first day of the show and it runs from 10:00 to 8:00 Friday 10:00 to 6:00 Saturday and 11:00 to 5:00 Sunday. It has been a slow but steady crowd here on Friday and the weather is beautiful. I just hope people will take advantage.
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To add to what David and David have already said about the spring Bayou City show, here are a couple of videos I shot during the festival.
Business cards were a hot item here. For many, it seemed as if the free handouts were all they could afford. I gave away many, many cards. I have them in two locations, one on my desk in the front of the booth, as shown in this video, and at the back, near the guest register. We must have given away at least 250 cards over the weekend. They have my QR code on them, as well as the standard URL. I haven't pulled stats from the last week yet, but it might be interesting to see how many hits the QR welcome page got after the show compared to the main home page.
There was performance art. In our section of the show, "Tree Guy" was very popular. A stilt walker in a very well made tree suit, he would wander around slowly and talk to the crowd. Some kids loved him, some kids were scared to death. He told jokes, bad jokes. In general, he stole the show whenever he was around.
There is lots to like about this show. Setup is easy, especially if you come on Wednesday, or early on Thursday. But the park path is narrow, and you have a limited amount of places to park. Big rig? Get there early, as I did. I was able to unload and get my truck and trailer parked in the back forty early on Wednesday.
We lucked out on the weather. Tuesday it poured all day. Houston and the surrounding area got nearly 6 inches of rain. But it cleared out Wednesday morning, and by noon, skies were sunny and the weather was cool. It was a gorgeous weekend for Houstonites. Normally, if the heat doesn't kill you, the humidity will. But this weekend, there was neither. Highs in the low 80's and lots of shade in our section made for a comfortable show.
Layout is average. Some spots had good park area behind them, while others had none. The whole show site is fenced in to control the gate. They charge $12 admission for adults and teenagers, kids are free. So they have to fence it. It has a big perimeter, too. Since the rains soaked the park, and many trees died in last year's drought, the park itself was in sad shape. Lots of lakes, puddles and swamps. This was one show that definitely required mosquito repellent. Some folks had a slough across from the booth, or behind it. My friend Randy Kuntz and some of his neighbors went to Home Depot and bought 4x8' sheets of CDX plywood to cover the mud holes. It worked, but it wasn't pretty. As David Forster commented, there was a stub near the food tents with about 12-14 artists on it. Bad idea, sorry. Both David and his neighbor, Brian Miller, complained about the slow traffic there.
But, despite the crowds, sales were slow for many people. The crowds were mainly there for entertainment. I saw a lot of 2-D prints walking by, but mostly smaller in size. Friday was quite slow for me, with only a couple of small sales. Saturday was a bit better, but way down in comparison to the fall show downtown. Expecting Sunday to be better, I was disappointed in the quality of the crowd. Many more walkers and folks grabbing business cards without really looking at the work, or engaging at all. Talking to this crowd usually scared them off. I did have several good nibbles on the larger pieces, but the bee-backs did not come back. It's just too hard to get into the park.
One detriment to buying anything larger at this show was the logistics of getting it home. With only two gates into the park, and very little on-site parking, patrons either had to lug their art on a shuttle bus or ask the artist to deliver it. The show does offer shuttle service to a nearby mall, but there really is no place for the patrons to park here within a reasonable distance of the show. VIPs were able to park near the entrance, but that's about it.
Nha Vuu and her three-year old daughter, in Nha's sunny new double booth.
Bright points:
Box lunch, at a reasonable price ($5), delivered to your booth. Pre-ordered, it's a real convenience, especially if you are on your own.
Lots of volunteers to watch your booth, if you needed a bathroom break.
And real flush toilets in a couple areas of the park. Rudimentary, but running water. Shower curtains instead of doors made for an interesting experience when reading the morning news.
Lots of bottled water, snacks and really hideous canned tea, also handed out by the volunteers
Great hot breakfast each morning near the food booths. A wonderful quiche on Friday, breakfast burritos on Saturday, and quiche again on Sunday. Weak coffee, juice, fruit, sweet rolls.
Free parking on the back loop. But you had to get there before 8 AM each day to get through the main gate. The show opens at 10. So there's plenty of time to eat breakfast, stroll the mile-long perimeter and chat witcher friends, hit the head, open the booth. Very relaxed.
Needs improvement:
The park is in sad shape. If this park were in Detroit, I'd be scared to death that crack dealers were lurking in the johns. Hence the shower curtains, I guess. Many trees were lost in last year's drought, and many more look poised to go. But the park itself doesn't look like it gets much maintenance. Piles of debris, many holes where trees once stood, vines twirling up the trunks of trees. Lovely cement picnic benches, but overgrown with moss.
The VIP party is on Sunday afternoon, in contrast to the Fall show, where it is on Saturday evening. While donating a piece gets you in, in practice, it's pretty tough to leave the booth to attend from 2-4. The food supposedly was terrific, but we never got up to the tent to see.
Crowds were there, but they didn't buy larger work. There's no patron pickup program, since it's impossible to get a golf cart around when the show is busy. Certainly the artists don't have the time to walk half a mile to Gate Two to drop off a piece. Delivery to the patrons home is the only real option at this show. And I'm sure it hurts sales for some artists, including me.
Music on the main stage was too loud, and sometimes inappropriate for talking about art. While certainly cultural in nature, having modern dance performances, mariachi bands and the marching band detracts from the focus on art. I have the same complaint with our local show, "Art and Apples".
All in all, it's a nice show, and well-run. But sales weren't there for many people. Would I go back? It's a long, long drive to Houston, almost as long as the drive to the east coast of Florida. I'll have to think about it.
Postscript:
I took a couple of days off before heading home, and drove west into the Texas Hill Country. The bluebonnets were in full bloom, and I wanted to experience them first hand. I would have stayed longer if the weather would have cooperated, but a storm front was moving in. I had one good day. This shot is from the area north of Frederickburg known as the "Bluebonnet Trail".
"Field of Dreams" -- the ball field at the Crabapple Community Center.
Here is another photo which shows the show site well.
Also I left out some important points. Kathleen Hughes, the Event Director, established an Artist Advisory Board for the show 9 years ago and their suggestions have greatly helped improve the show as Kat and the Staff listen and actually incorporate many of these ideas in the progressive success of the show. The entire staff is a pleasure to work with and bring a positive outlook with great vision to everything they do. During the show TV
cameras were seen several times shooting footage to be aired on major channels so that the Tourist population
who might not be reading papers knew about the show. Signage was large and prevalent in the area for the show as well. Hope this helps to clarify some things.
Should show organizers be allowed to show at juried shows? It seems way too easy to stack the cards in the process whether they are on the jury or help in jury selection of the jurors. Have any show organizers ever been rejected from a show?
