33rd Indiana Heritage Arts Juried Exhibition

Indiana Heritage Arts is a nonprofit organization with a mission of nurturing the rich art heritage of Brown County and the famous Hoosier Group Impressionist painters from the turn of the 19th Century.  http://www.browncountyartgallery.org/indiana/heritagearts.html That group included T.C. Steele, Otis Adams, William Forsyth, and Otto Stark among others.  This exhibition is perhaps the most important annual exhibition for realist painters that happens in Indiana.  Any painter who has ever lived in Indiana can enter.  All original paintings must be delivered to the Brown County Art Gallery for jurying.  This year the juror was Kathryn Stats, a fabulous landscape painter from Utah.  http://www.kathrynstats.com/   Collectors seek out this exhibition to purchase the best paintings by the best artists in the state.  I was delighted to have two paintings accepted and to win an Award of Merit for "January on Moot's Creek"  http://kathrynclarkfineart.com/works/569710/january-on-moots-creek.  This is the other painting that was accepted:

"Voyageur Sailing the Wabash"  oil, 14" x 11"

This exhibition is still on display, but only till June 25th.  It's at the Brown county Art Gallery, corner of Main and Artists Drive in Nashville, IN.  open till 5pm each day.  I hope you can work a visit into your busy schedule this week.  Their phone is 812-988-0099.

Along with painting landscapes out in the elements, I'm trying to paint in my studio some this summer from "field studies" (smallish plein air paintings) and photo references.  In this way, I'll hopefully be able to create a couple of larger paintings for a fall exhibition that's coming up fast. 

Also on a techy note about this blog, Google now offers an option for blogs to be viewed on iphones and other android devices, so I have applied that format to this blog.  You can now see it on any computer device for your convenience.  I don't have any of those devices so I can't see what that looks like.  So I hope you like what you see.  Let me know.  Your comments are always enjoyed by me, and I hope you'll enjoy the rest of June!

The Silent and Beautiful Salt Marshes of South Carolina

My painting buddies and I just returned from a barrier island off the coast of South Carolina called Seabrook, about a thirty minute drive from Charleston. Three mornings of the week we were there, I walked from their home out on to this vast, still, quiet, salt marsh to try to capture its beauty.  Because the marsh is ecologically fragile and filled with deep mud, tall sea grass, tiny crabs, and other small wild life, there are wooden board walks above the sea grass that slink out into it. This is where I painted.

"Salt Marsh Channels", oil on linen board, 9" x 12"

This is the second view of the salt marsh which I painted from the dock in the main water channel. 

"Salt Marsh Dock", oil on linen board, 12" x 9"

Back on our host's porch, I made some final changes.

Although we didn't get a chance to paint along the ocean side of the island, we did take many photos of the ocean, boats, and much more.  Here are a few pics to give you the flavor of the place:

The commercial fishermen were out shrimping when we were here.  

The restaurant to the right where we tasted the local catch looked out on a dock of charter fishing boats. 

I hope your sun is setting in a beautiful spot as well.  Until next time......I'll be finding exciting spots to paint back home in Indiana.