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I thought I would share this with everyone who accepts Credit Card Sales.  Since the majority of sales are paid by Credit Cards, I noticed an increasing amount of customers write on the back of their cards for the merchant to "check ID". Most of the time (to be honest, when I remember)  I look for this and I do ask for ID's. I figure they wouldn't put it on the back if they didn't want us to ask. The response 100% of the time is a "thank you for asking", most people don't check". Im sure its just not with the artist but big box stores as well. I would encourage all artist who accept credit cards to ask for ID's if stated on the card. Customers really do appreciate it and it makes us look professional, even more so then most merchants who don't ask. Just my advice.

This last weekend I did it! I finally took the plunge and drove from Tennessee up to NYC to do the American Craft Festival at Lincoln Center. It's a pricy show but I thought that possibly my work would do well in the North, and felt it was time to test the waters. What was I thinking? Granted I am an old Jersey Girl and no innocent in the Big Apple, so I thought I was fully prepared to handle what the city could dish out.

First things first, have any of you ever tried to drive in New York City? I could have possibly done it if I had been hooked up to an IV of Valium as I was driving, nah, even that wouldn't have been enough. Now I know I sound like a wuss, but there was no parking anywhere, and I had been up since 4 am. People that parked where they could, didn't move and the rest of us kept circling Columbus Ave. praying something would open up...the show started at 12 noon....I was still praying at 10:45.

I finally found a place about three excruciating long blocks away from my booth. Luckily, I begged my nephew from the City to come to help me unload, but even then it was the worst and hardest load in I have ever, absolutely ever, done. This was not just my Encaustic paintings but a Crafthut and Propanels too....I was ready to leave the minute I parked. By the time I set up in the blazing sun, totally drenched with enough black and blues to make anyone think I had been mugged on the way there. I was ready to reap the rewards. After all this is where the savvy live, those with an eye for the unusual on the cusp of the art scene.....I felt that it might just be my day....NOT!

The crows were sporadic, with a surge when the shows or the ballet got out, but dead otherwise. During the lull I started walking around and realized that I was among the most "buy-sell" I had ever seen at one show. It was so outright obvious- crappy mass produced jewelery and clothing were everywhere. Yes, there were legit artist too but surrounded by the buy and sell I started questioning everything. Did the potter really make those pots or just farm them out from Peru? How could that designer make that many(seemed like 500) tie dyed jackets? It made me skeptical about everything there, and that is just not fair to the artists that actually really do make their own art. I am not sure the buying public really cared much, the buying power that first day was non-existent.

Yea, On Saturday I sold a bit but not enough to pay that booth fee. Sunday was better and I actually had a 1500. dollar sale and a few other good ones but I am not sure it was really worth it financially. I sure didn't see many big packages going by, and one painter that drove from California, who was there two weeks, sold nothing. The promoter, (one should never bash a promoter-right?) Well, this one was just rude, I always try to talk and introduce myself and I did.... and he didn't say one word, just looked at me... and turned around and talked to the artist next to me- totally ignored me...made me wonder if I had something hanging out of my nose....no luck, just rude, and I hate to say this, because I did meet some really nice people (and those are my roots), but hey.... that's New York.

I smartened up and moved my car early Sunday and got a closer spot but by 5:30 a micro burst flipped a few tents with disastrous results and the the threat of a storm on the way had us all trying to pack everything as fast as possible. I had hired an employee to help me load out- but he was no where to be found. Where was that Valium IV when I needed it...Luck came in the form of my next door neighbors, whose driver couldn't come for another hour. Julio and Nemo (fabulous fiber artists) were the best thing about the show-two of the funniest and kindest guys I have ever met. Shout out to Exot Treasures...and Julio helped me load up.

I was on my way by around 7:30 and heading to Pennsylvania...through a backed up Lincoln Tunnel, and the tolls, don't get me started on the tolls.....In the end, there were some wonderful moments and great people but would I do it again? There is not enough Valium in the world........

Event Name: Arts Alive

Location: Northside Park (125th Street), Ocean City MD

Promoter: Town of Ocean City - Special Events

Dates: June 15-16, 2013

Show Review

I have participated in this event for 5 or 6 years now and have always enjoyed the event. Pluses: Friday all day set-up, friendly and attentive staff, lots of booth sitting volunteers from the local arts organizations, in most years, you can park right behind your booth to set up, tear down and you don't have to seek out any designated really inconvenient or expensive parking facilities, juried event, nice prizes for artists, attentive local police overnight security. Negatives: weather variability (wind, rain, storms, heat) over the historic record of the event, some inexperienced exhibitors (but we all have to learn somewhere and they passed jury muster)

Friday - My wife and I left later in the afternoon b/c winds were supposed to be 15-25 mph - and b/c we didn't have out acts together to get the h_ll out of Dodge. Arrived about 6:30 PM to calm to light breeze conditions... went ahead and decided to get tent and walls set-up. Had tent up and sidewalls attached, stabilizer bars in, pro panels set up and leveled, panel feet zip tied to sta-bars, canopy hooks installed and zip tied into sta-bars. As we were finishing the last few tasks, we were closely watching a storm which was moving from due north to due south... on an evening when none were predicted. Police security can by as we were nearly done and said that a thunderstorm was approaching which had reportedly produced a waterspout north of our location.

We saw it coming, too and it looked a lot like a bow wave type of approach boding a violent wind profile... We had everything zipped up and clamped down just as it was starting to blow a bit and spit rain. It looked very threatening with a wall-type cloud, and low hanging, stringy clouds which seemed to head right for us. Since it was nearly overhead, we moved to a different part of the facility east of out tent position. As we parked, the wind really picked up and then, like a wall, there was about a minute's worth of really high velocity sustained gusts. We watched with dismay as several tents appeared to be taking the worst of this and/or falling. I thought I saw our tent visibly damaged by these gusts and started back to it.

Well, we arrived back and indeed, our tent had taken a hit - the top was partially blown off. The wind had gotten under the gap between wall and top and inflated the tent. However, the clamps held the wall zippers and the two of the four Velcro attachment points for the top let go - acting effectively as a safety valve. I got up on top of the set-up table and removed the center pole of our EZ-Up Express II and took the rest of the top off. Nothing inside the tent was hurt, but we could see that others were not as fortunate. We had 160 pounds of weight in weight bags, 9 pro panels and 6 sta-bars holding our tent down. The reason that there wasn't more damage was that zip tie-ing the whole structure together added rigidity and aggregate total weight to the structure. So our tent didn't move, but the top popped off partially with no damages to tent, top, or contents.

On our side of the lagoon there was one EZ-Up-type that was down and broken, and another which had a bent leg. There was also an expensive barrel dome-type tent which had also sailed about 25 feet from it's location and was crumpled with one leg under the dome and another bent at a funny angle.

The EZ-Up-type with the bent leg had luckily had the back door zipper open up while the winds were blowing - taking the worst of the sail effect away. This tent was also anchored well with stakes and ropes. The tent which looked like toast was also a pop-up whose owner we knew and whose paintings were inside set up on display panels - the operating words are "were inside". They weren't currently. The artist and the artist who was set up next to this EZ-Up arrived and quickly assessed the damage. I went over to assist. The paintings were almost all undamaged despite being tossed and panels toppled. We stored them in the artist's neighbor's tent and disassembled and stowed the racks. Then we disassembled the top and sides from the damaged tent. The tent suffered canopy cross-member damage along the canopy perimeter - with a couple of them having sheared right at the fitting which acted as a pivot point. Conceivably, this was mendable, so we gently folded the tent up as there were no bent or bowed parts. The Ocean City Police security were very helpful and several of them were working to secure the damaged tents and any scattered merchandise.

We then went to the crumpled dome tent. When it flew, it looked like it took off nearly straight up as it only seemed to have knocked over a couple of the glass display units and there was a good bit of broken glass from a couple of shelves which shattered. We gently stood the dome back up and it stayed up. We didn't check the interior of it for damages, but later found out it had suffered a bent or broken leg which would have to be replaced. We did find the exhibitor's name and phone numbers in one of the totes on a card and called it - leaving a message.

The common factor in all the tents that we saw that flew was insufficient weights or tie-downs.

We left the rest of the recovery efforts to security and park special events staff who arrived shortly after the gale. They gathered up and matched tents with spots and secured what they could from further damages. As I said, staff and security at this event are stand-up folks. We went to our hotel and checked in (Using the Corporate Lodging Consultants card which saved us about 50% of the normal weekend in season beach resort room rate). We ordered pizza and wings and made a couple stiff margaritas in our take-along Magic Bullet.... I later spoke to the daughter of the dome tent's owner and briefed her on what we had seen.....

End of Part 1 - Stay tuned

From our school days learning about Colonial living the word "pewter" rings a bell.

The images it brings to mind are of traditional pitchers and candlesticks and other functional items. Pewter is a malleable metal that can be spun, hammered, molded, turned on a lathe.

What is exciting about the work of Rebecca Hungerford is that she takes this modest metal and creates exciting contemporary objects. It is not your great-grandmother's pewter! Her long apprenticeship (nearly 40 years) of creating traditional pieces has led to her current work, amazingly modern objects that push the boundaries of the materials and imagination. 

Who knew pewter could be organic and feminine? Rebecca's enchantment with the medium, plus the hammering, soldering, welding, etching and engraving the pewter yields exactly that. She loves to color it and add pearls and semi-precious stones to it and describes it as "jewelry for your home."

Meet her June 21-23 in Milwaukee, WI, at the Lakefront Festival of the Arts at the Milwaukee Art Museum.

Learn more about Rebecca and her work: www.artfaircalendar.com/art_fair

So, I just joined Art Fair Insiders. I had two outstanding fairs in the last two weeks and thought, "Hey, let's get more involved."

So, I joined, and bought the downloadable pair of reports, the ones with the instant download and the 100% satisfaction guarantee.

Well, I paid, got my receipt instantly, but have seen neither report. Nor any email giving me access info. So my 100% satisfaction is already down a coupla points.

I sent an email to the vendor, cs@millionairepotential.com, stating this, and all that I received was an email failure-to-deliver report that my email was rejected as SPAM. Down goes that satisfaction index some more.

Someone tell me, please, that it isn't usually like this and that it gets better.

Just wanted to share our experience.  Have not yet decided that I want to go the Light Dome style quite yet - Looks like a ton of work to me.  We used EZ Ups from Sams for years, and last fall we decided to upgrade to a King Canopy Goliath.  What a difference.  Weighs the same as the EZ Up, about 3 inches longer in the bag, better bag, better top and sidewalls, and exponentially stronger frame.  Legs are hexagonal, crossmembers easily 3 times stronger than EZups.  All aluminum, no 'finger tearing push buttons', and just all around far better.  It's no Light Dome, but for $400 at Sam's Club online, we are more than happy with it.  When we spring for the Light Dome, this will be a super 2nd canopy / backup for years and years.  Oh, and it goes up and down like an EX Up but goes back in the bag so much easier!

My wife Sherry, is a painter. She does original studio and plein air works. This is a description of her work we wrote for a recent show application;

"Original studio and plein air works capturing the splendor and harmony of our natural world. My main source of inspiration comes from seeing God’s incredible handiwork in the mountain vistas and captivating countryside of East Tennessee. I also draw upon places visited in our frequent travels, Some of my work aspires to preserve our heritage with scenes of old home places and other structures in their natural settings, All paintings are created with acrylics on canvas using a limited palette."

Sherry does not want to do prints(and I agree). However, my observations from our first two festivals is that the prints are practically the only sales any of the painters are making. We do not expect to make a lot of money on the shows, but we would like to cover time and expenses with enough left over to buy some art, but we have not even come close to breaking even. In two shows, we have sold one $50 miniature. We have received lots of traffic in our booth, lots of oohs and aahhs, lots of compliments from patrons and artists about the work and our display, lots of question and answer sessions regarding specific works, but only one small sale.  We love to travel and see new places, we enjoy the atmosphere of the festivals, and we have met quite a few friendly and interesting people, especially the other artists. My concern is that the festivals are not the venue for Sherry's work. I watch the crowd parading by and I see almost no one carrying paintings. Ceramics, jewelry, prints, seem to sell. Our price range is $50 for a 5" by 5" gallery wrapped miniature to $850 for a custom framed 28" by 22" or 22" by 28" depending on orientation studio work. Sherry's plein air works are usually custom framed 11" x 14" or 14" by 11" and our priced at $225. The most common size for her studio work is custom framed 16" x 20" or 20" x 16" priced at $500.

Conversely, in the one juried exhibition at the Knoxville Museum of Art in which Sherry participated, she submitted three plein air works completed that week and one studio piece. Two of the plein air pieces sold within an hour of the exhibition opening.

If the exposure Sherry's work gets at the shows leads to later sales, the expense would be justified, but it is too soon to tell. The chance of winning an award for later marketing purposes and prize money to defer expenses would be another potential justification. If we did make a profit at a festival that money would most likely be used to buy some of the beautiful stuff we have seen from the other artists. We never could remember where the booth with the awesome hummingbird feeders were at our first show. Yes, I am an avid birder.

Even though both of our first two-day shows were plagued by one day of bad weather. Our experience combined with the experiences of other painters on this site, have lead me to question our marketing strategy. In addition all the administrative and marketing stuff has taken away from the time Sherry has to do what she loves, which is either get out in the field and paint or paint in her studio. She loves attending workshops and participating in plein air events which are also on weekends. Although she loves meeting and talking to people, she has little patience for the administrative or marketing stuff, she loves to create. I am trying to fill the administrative, marketing technical, and road crew roles.

I realize our first year or two we must bite the bullet and take all the festivals we can get to build up a resume. This weekend we are doing a small local indoor juried art and craft fair 10 minutes from home at the Tennessee Creates Arts and Craft Fair held as part of the Secret City Festival in Oak Ridge Tennessee. The show is relatively new and mostly craft but would like to attract more fine artists. The Oak Ridge Art Association(we are members) was gracious enough to find space for us after we were rejected by the Whalehead Club, Under the Oaks festival in Corolla, North Carolina and thus missed their application deadline. Fortunately, they had a cancellation and were able to get us in. We do not have to worry about rain and we get to sleep in our own bed. The $125 booth fee is also reasonable.

So my questions for the painter. What marketing strategies should we look to to help pay for our addiction. Are art fairs and festivals the appropriate venue? Which shows are the best for Sherry's style of original paintings? We do not want to stop doing the festivals, we have enjoyed participating. However, do we go in with the idea that we will sell little to nothing at the festivals and find other more effective ways to sell her work. 

So if you have a few minutes, I would love to hear suggestions from some of the other painters about what works. 

As always, thanks for your feedback and support.

Once again I pitched my tent at the Stone Arch Art Festival in Minneapolis, MN. I've been a regular at this show for quite a few years and it's always been good enough to come back. But the last few years this show has really had some problems.

I noticed that the tents this year were really packed in more tightly than in years past. I can only guess that the show wants as many warm artist bodies as they can get. Of course there were some booth changes because of some oversites in planning.

It started at 11:00 (which was a little odd) and went to 7:00 on Saturday. I had some good sales (mostly regular customers) until around 3:00. Then it started to rain. Pour would be a better description. I had a good puddle in my tent. The rain lasted about an hour. After that a lot of the crowd did come back but sales were nill. 

The day Sunday started again at 11:00 and went until 5:00. Last year this show went much later on Sunday so I'm glad they changed it back to 5:00. Sales for me were really bad on Sunday. Again, tons of people! Oh, did I forget to mention that they also had a car show along the same street in back of the artists tents at the show? How could I forget! As long as I've done the show there has alway a very small row of classic cars toward the end of the show. No problem, I like to look at beautiful cars. This year the whole thing exploded and was maybe 4 times as big?! There were cars along the whole length of one end of the show (my end). If that wasn't bad enough we weren't informed that this was going to happen. The back of the booths were marked closer to the curb than usual. Once the cars were brought in and parked (against the curb) I had about 3 foot of space in the back of my tent for me, my helper, and all of my stuff, trying not to hit the car as I tried to do business. It didn't work well. The card didn't even pay anything to be there! I think most of the people there Sunday were just looking at the cars.

These were just the a few problems with this show. Last year someone new took over, and I think they are trying, but have a ways to go.

This is just my experience. Other areas of the show might have been much better. Some artists may have had much better sales. For me this show is just now worth going back. I'll maybe keep my ears open for changes and try it in a few years, but no guarantee.

August 16 & 17  
Frankfort, Michigan
Market Square Park
Coordinated by the Frankfort-Elberta Chamber of Commerce
Fri. 4pm-8pm; Sat. 10am-5pm
180+ Artists
Deadline:  July 1 - original deadline May 1

Where is Frankfort?  High on a bluff in the heart of Michigan's summer vacation land, the hidden gem of Northern Michigan on Lake Michigan and Betsie Bay.

From the Chamber of Commerce:

What's not to like?  

• two days
• beautiful time of year in northern Michigan
• spacious booth spaces:  12x12
• great booth fee: $105 for both days!
• Jury fee $15

There is also fun for the whole family with all the downtown businesses as well as a collector car show 3 blocks away, among many other activities that day and great local food.  You might even want to fit in some salmon fishing!

LATE APPLICATION FEE: Due to the numerous late applications in years past - we are applying a $25 late application fee for ALL applications received after May 1.

Download the application: www.frankfort-elberta.com/index

For more questions contact:  Joanne Bartley, Executive Director, C of C at (231)352-7251 or fcofc@frankfort-elberta.com

For more information about this tourism mecca: www.frankfort-elberta.com

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Find more art fairs that are looking for artists: www.CallsforArtists.com

Have a show across from a beach next weekend. First outdoor show with a tent. I have been reading some of the horror stories of artists returning for their second day only to find a storm or heavy wind ripped through while they slept and now everything is in shambles. My question is, if you are informed and keep abreast of the weather, and know that the night might bring something bad, have any of you ever closed up completely, taking everything with you, including your tent, and just set up lock stock and barrel the next morning? It seems that as much work as that might be, wouldn't it make sense to do that instead of leaving it all to chance?

Also, by the same token, if the morning seemed grand but now it's noon, and you begin to hear or see rumblings that a storm is brewing, have any of you closed down and taken everything away with you in the middle of the day?

I realize that there isn't always time to do this, but it also seems that sometimes there is actually enough time to get it all together and get the heck out of there, including your tent - EZ Up or not.

I have heard that some artists completely lower their tents at night as much as they can, dropping certain things to the ground to lessen the danger of a sudden rain storm or wind gust might incur. Do any of you do this?

Hi Friends, here is my review of this show....

The College Hills Art Fair is held on Friday and Saturday on the campus of the University of Northern Iowa.  The setting is beautiful and easily accessible to load and unload.  We were allowed to drive up to our booths for set up and tear down.  Needless to say, set up and tear down were both extremely easy.  This show has 75 artists in the usual mix of mediums and is well juried and professionally organized.  I have to say that the organizers did an excellent job.  The staff was always available and volunteers were abundant and eager to assist artists in any way possible.  It is clear that the people involved in running this show have been doing it a long time.  Overall, this is a nice show in a nice location.

This was the first year for the show being in June instead of it's usual July date.  The dreaded date change...I am not sure if it was responsible for the remainder of the bog, but you be the judge.

Friday had good weather and the show was from 11am-8pm.  If there were 2,000 people there, I would have been surprised.  I had dismal sales, a total of $200.00 for 9 hours of show.  What was selling in absolute abundance was the Kettle Korn LOL.  Anyway, in all fairness, artists around me said they were doing OK, so this may have just been a case of the area not being interested in my work.  It happens, I get it. 

Saturday was more of the same with even smaller crowds.  I spoke to some artists again who said they were doing Ok and two who said this would be their last year as they had not made enough to come back.  At that point, I would have been thrilled to just cover expenses, but alas, I ended Saturday with total sales of $75.00, bringing my total show sales to $275.00.  I did not come close to covering expenses.  The weather on Saturday was cloudy with some very light rain that started at 12:30pm and lasted on and off until about 3pm.  It wasn't enough to make much use of an umbrella, but the show promptly died once the rain started. 

Awards/Judging:  I don't usually comment on this as I never get too involved with the judging and awards process.  I feel that we have already been judged once to get in to a show and for me, that's enough.  There was much chatter going on between artists at this show about how they all felt the judging was biased and unfair.  Maybe someone will elaborate on this more, I include it in the blog only beacuse it was a serious topic of conversation among many artists.   

The show has a children's area with donated work from exhibiting artists sold to kids at less than $10.00.  Just about all of us donated to it and even the kids tent was deserted most of the time.  I donated three pieces that were all sold, but my neighbor, a jeweler actually had work returned to him at the end of the show.   

Artist treatment/amenities:  Artist treatment is superior at this show.  Volunteers are everywhere and cell numbers are given for booth sitters.  Booth sitters are exceptionally nice people, eager to help and friendly.  There was a Thursday night wine tasting and hors d'ouvre party free to artists, a buffet Friday night, free to artists, water delivered to the booth several times and they even came around at the end of the show with free boxed lunches for artists to take on the road.  They also had an artist only hospitality room with snacks, beverages and a restroom.  Very artist friendly show, they truly care and it shows.

I want to clarify that I thought this show was stellar in terms of organization, planning, layout, jury, location and artist treatment.  It is a nice event with nice staff and volunteers.  It did not deliver sales for me or crowds.  I am dissappointed that I have to take it off my list for 2014, because I went to school in Iowa and have a connection and long held affinity for this area.  It is a shame that my sales were so bad, but being an artist who is reliant on shows to pay the bills, I will not be able to go back or recommend it to others in my same situation. I know there were artists who read AFI content there, maybe they will comment on their experiences.  As I stated earlier, I did terrible in sales, others however, said they were doing ok.              

I will be cleaning out the workshop this week since I do not have to scramble to replace sold work for my next show.  I will be doing the Art Fair on The Square in Bloomington, IN on June 22.  This is a one day show (my only one day show of the year), and will review it here next weekend.  Thanks for reading.... 

TUESDAY: JUNE 18, 3 PM ET

Art fairs not working for you? Not getting into the shows where you know you can sell your work? Tired of being on the road? Looking for a new adventure? 

Meet two painters who can say both yes and no to the questions above. Yes, the art fairs work but they wanted to try some  new ideas for marketing their work. Where did they turn? Social media!

• In March, Carrie Jacobson, a painter from Connecticut, drove from Virginia to Arizona, painting, doing a show and visiting her dad. She found buyers  who paid for the whole trip in advance and she had more paintings to sell when she reached her destination.
   
• Painter Scott Coleman from Georgia has been doing art fairs forever (I met him at my first art show back in the good old days), but in recent years has been using his blog and Facebook to sell "a painting a day." He sold 365 "Daily Cupcake" paintings in a year and a half. 

Imagine -- no rejection letters, no booth fees, no storms, just creating art -- and oh, Marketing!  Remember, being an artist is 50% creating and 50% marketing. 

Is there some inspiration here for your art marketing?

We'll talk about using a blog, Facebook and, email marketing to drive sales. 

This should be very interesting, especially in light of the recent storms in Virginia Beach. Both of these artists have participated in that show and Carrie is participating this year. 

Questions you'd like me to ask? Put them in the comments below. You can call in to talk with us: (805) 243-1338.

David Levy holds on to his tent on Thursday as storms moved across the Boardwalk art Show.

Photo by Bill Tiernan, at the Virginian-Pilot

More: http://hamptonroads.com/2013/06/storms-brought-brief-heavy-rain-and-wind-region

September 21 & 22  
Park Forest, Illinois
Downtown Park Forest
Presented by the Tall Grass Arts Association
10am-5pm
100 Artists
Deadline: June 29

The Park forest Art Fair is an outdoor fair held in the streets of Downtown Park Forest.  Known as an exceptionally artist-friendly show (especially emerging artists-friendly) because of its amenities for artists and reasonable registration fee, the fair features:

• $175 Registration fee
• $2,500 in cash awards and purchase prizes
• a complimentary breakfast on Saturday morning and a fabulous dinner party for the artists on Saturday evening after the close of the fair
• Overnight security on Saturday night, which includes conveniently located, locked storage space
• booth sitters are available as needed over the weekend

Artists who participate in the fair report their pleasure that fair attendees, traditionally, stop and chat with the artists.  One artist, who shows regularly through the Midwest region, reported that he sold more artworks on Saturday of the fair than he had sold in a single day at any other fair in which he participated.

The fair is promoted in the regional press (magazines and newspapers), social networking sites and advertised on WFMT and WBBM radio during the morning rush hour.  Musical entertainment is provided all day, both days, as well as a variety of food vendors.  There are many activities especially for children such as an art contest, tie dying, story times with art projects illustrating the story, painting murals, etc.

The Park Forest Art Fair is the second oldest juried fair in the  Chicagoland area.  It is a fine art fair that showcases artists who work in a variety of media. Over the years, artists have participated who travel from as far away as Canada and California.  Although the jurying deadline is June 29, jurying will take place on a monthly basis for applications received during the month so that artists can plan to add the fair to their schedules.

The application and information can be downloaded from: www.tallgrassarts.org.  

Approval through the jurying process also confers the status of Gallery Artist and permits artists to participate in the annual Tall Grass Gallery Artists Exhibit.

Note of interest:  The Village of Park Forest was built for the purpose of housing GI's returning from WWII.  Incorporated in 1949, less than 6 years later, it was home to an arts association that operated a gallery, school and art fair.  The arts association was followed a few years later by a symphony orchestra, classical chorale and resident, equity theater company-a very welcoming home for the arts and for creative people! 

Please  join us. 

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Find more art fairs for your 2013 art fair season in great places like Park Forest and many other special communities across the country:  www.CallsforArtists.com

We headed to Columbus excited to be back at the riverfront.  Many fond memories and great sales were ours at this location in the past.  Good things were said about the 2012 show so we were ready.  The new riverfront is fantastic and the perfect venue for an art fair.

Set up in the pouring rain on Thursday.  Happy to get the bad weather out of the way...still excited for the weekend.  Friday was slow for us, but again that had been predicted by others who were there last year.  Saturday we received a much appreciated merit award with money...yeah!  The crowds came and walked and looked and walked...one sweet sale to a wonderful couple saved the day.  Now all hopes are on Sunday which never really happened for us.  I know some people were doing business, mostly lower end.  The beer booth across from us was filling backpacks with money!  

Tear down was easy for us.  Lance somehow most always manages that.  The first time I have ever seen an exhibitor lift their shirt to get their van on site...now who was that, Nels??  and it worked :))

Getting ready for Lakefront...see you all there.

vicki

This is a wonderful resource for archival framing advice for my 2D artist peeps. There are videos, as well as photos and text to assist you in properly framing your projects. Metroframe also designed the wonderful frame profile for my architectural paintings on panels.              

http://www.metroframe.com/framing-advice/

Let's reward the people who wrote the best content on ArtFairInsiders.com in May.

1. "Top Ten Lessons Learned from our First Show or Learning to Swim By Jumping in the Pool", John Smith, May 8
2. "2nd Annual Dewey Beach ArtsFest - The Rain Date May 12, 2013", Mark V. Turner, May 15
3. "Broad Ripple Review," Margaret Luttrell, May 22
4. "Musings from Mulvane .. in Topeka, KS", Brian Berkun, June 2

Also, many people keep this site helpful and the rewards are few. Let's reward some of the people who give so generously of their time. Who has been especially helpful to you this month? They will receive a fabulous Red Dot on their profile picture.

Choose 2:

1. Maryllis Wolfgang
2. Mark V. Turner
3. Bill McLauchlan
4. Kay Cummings
5. Pat Falk
6. Carrie Jacobson
7. John Smith
8. Brian Billings
9. Chris Pawlik

Many thanks to them specifically and to all the rest of you who make this site useful to so many.

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Court the Arts, Castle Rock, Colorado is a new show established this year by the Greater  Castle Rock Art Guild.  In part, the show was established because of dissatisfaction and expense of the September show produced by the Chamber of Commerce.  I won’t go into everything I heard about the latter except “every horror story you hear is true”.   I normally do not do first time shows but I was personally invited and I wanted to support a local event.  Also, I had trim to do a June show that was needed on my schedule.  The guild has also opened a gallery on Wilcox Street which has a classroom for workshops.  

Castle Rock is the County Seat for Douglas County, which is often cited as one of the wealthiest counties in the US.  It also has one of the country’s highest per capita horse ownerships (horses go with money).  Other than government, the town provides the usual service businesses to a wealthy suburban bedroom community that commutes to Denver or Colorado Springs.  Much of the residential property is rural.  The town is in the I-25 Corridor about midway between Denver and Colorado Springs.

The show was held on the Court House lawn which is on the main street through town providing good visibility to street traffic.  Booth fees were $100 but mine, being late, was $175.  Set up and take down were easy but you did have to dolly on sidewalks from your site to parking.  I don’t think anyone had to dolly farther than about ½  block and there were wheelchair slopes on the curbs. Set up started Friday afternoon at 4:00 which is a little late but employees had to leave the Court House.  The show ran from 10:00am the 5:00pm Saturday and Sunday June 8 and 9.  From my studio, the show was about 15 miles away or a 20 minute commute on a rural highway.  Sunday morning was spectacular with clear blue sky and snowcapped peaks  of the Front Range from Longs Peak to the north and Pikes Peak to the south; about half of Colorado.  Thunderstorms were forecast for Friday afternoon, but they blew through around 2:00-3:00 before set up.  Saturday was in the 80’s except when cloud cover came over and then it was a bit chilly.  Sunday was clear and in the 80’s.

There was a good selection of art but it was heavy on the painting side reflecting guild membership I believe.  The crowd was small (fewer than 2000) but they were spending money.   Some artists did not do well, yet I did see some large pieces of wall art going out to cars.  I did not make the $2K minimum for my rule of returning, but our expenses were nil and proximity to home are the factors leading to wanting to do this one again.  My sales were in the $1-$1.5K range, and the average sale was $76.  A custom saddle client from twenty years ago bought a $235 belt.  I also made a lot of contacts with locals for gun leathers, special order work and saddle repairs.  All of this stuff materializes throughout the year after shows are over

THE FUN STUFF:  My booth faced Wilcox Street, the main street through town.  Castle Rock, Franktown, Sedalia  and Palmer Lake are  watering holes for bikers from Denver on their weekend rides (doctors and lawyers playing bad boys) so we saw lots of EXPESIVE Harleys and custom bikes with lots of custom paint and chrome.  There were lots of clubs showing their colors and a few hard core guys with beards flowing back over their shoulders.  Next were the restored vintage car guys and street rods cruising town.  Finally the retirees in their BMW, Audi, Jag, Porsche et. al. convertibles with the tops down plus or minus trophy wives.  The good looking tattooed biker gal with the long blond ponytail who waved at this old coot, made my day. LOL. Nuts and bolts of the show are in Art Show Reviews on this site.

Photos:  Castle Rock butte and new Veterans Memorial

                 Wilcox Street  booths, mine is in the shade

                 Court House booths

I just posted a new painting - Lavender on a Blue Chair. I came across a similar photo on-line and decided to paint my own version of it. You might like to purchase a mug with this image from Zazzle