The smiling, well-dressed lady in the bright blue bib strode into my booth, extended her hand, and said: "Hi, I'm Sharon. I'm a Rotarian. How can I serve you today?"
A Dr. Seuss couplet begins to spring to mind, but never mind that: Let's talk about this long-running show, held at the Venice Municipal Airport about 2 hours north of the Bonita Springs show.
This local event with the hometown-y feel has been running for years, and deserves to. Venice is a long-established town along Florida's Gulf coast, about a half-hour south of Sarasota. It's well known for its casual charm, beautiful beach, relaxed atmosphere, and an established working art community. The Rotarians take over the outskirts of this active airport, just off the easternmost runway, and bring in artists, crafters, a rock band or two, an antique car show, and a smattering of food vendors to make a nice weekend for the show's dedicated followers. Sharon the Rotarian was just one of the group's members who devote months and months of planning, and they do a fine job.
Logistics are a snap: You can check in on Friday, park right behind your booth location, and set up from there...a no-dolly weekend, nice!
And yet, there are challenges. The crowd is unfailingly friendly, but it is an older one, much like the Rotarian membership itself, and not buying as much art as it did in the past. I overheard the show director commenting that although the show is juried, nearly everyone who applied got in because the number of applications has been declining. Accordingly, there was lots of low-end craft, bead-kit jewelry and other buy-sell, and "art on a stick".
Although quality, sales and crowd size aren't by any stretch in a league with Barry Witt's Bonita behemoth, you can have a decent weekend here at minimal cost: Booth fee is about $235, and if you have a camper or RV you can stay overnight right behind your booth (though I commuted from my home in S. Fort Myers). There's a decent artist dinner on Saturday night with free beer and wine, breakfast both mornings, booth sitting by the likes of Sharon the Rotarian on request, and a crowd that enjoys and buys. The Rotarians even grant awards in multiple categories (first place is $250), plus a best in show ($500).
I made about 5x my booth fee plus the blue ribbon for photography, against expenses that were otherwise limited to a tankful of gas and a couple of bucks for the coffee vendor. Not a bad way to spend a weekend if you weren't in Bonita.
This would be an EXCELLENT show for a less-experienced artist/crafter to "get their feet wet," with lots of experienced veterans around to learn from.
And if you're one of the artists who complain that there's a dearth of community-run shows that love what they're doing and care about the artists, put this one on your list for 2012. The Rotarians work hard to serve up a slice of the "good old days," and they deserve our support.
Comments
I did the show last weekend also and had roughly the same sales Geoff quoted. That being said, the crowd was certainly down when I visited the show last year. I had to park about eight rows back, and I had a full view of the parking from my location and it was never more than three rows back.
The show is getting to be more craft than art and it also showed in one of the awards given to the folks who cut a wine bottle bottom off and suspend a shot glass in the middle to hold a votive candle. They were right next to the lady with the cardboard painted hats. Hey, you can't make this stuff up!
The potter next to me told me that he was down 80% at one time and then sold a few things on Sunday. The lady across from me with really beautiful floral paintings sold nothing.
I would be cautious recommending this to new people for one reason – it can be hard enough on those of us that have done shows for over 20 years, but for new folks to come and get skunked or sell little, it can be down-right depressing. If I had started in Florida versus the western United States, I probably would have become a teacher or a cab driver. Not that there is anything wrong with either of those, but Florida shows can be a challenge for the best artist.
Nels: Heh, heh...I passed on the bars, too many miles to drive to Ft. Myers. I've photographed some pelicans from that bar, though!
Appreciate the compliment on my writing style...but no, it's been around a while. I wrote and edited for a living before I picked up the camera again a few years ago.