This year, PAAC’s annual juried show is being held at Saks Gallery in Cherry Creek, 3019 East 2nd Avenue, Denver. The opening will be held this Friday, June 25th, from 5-9 p.m. the show runs for two weeks, through July 10. There should be lots of good art from all over the southwest. This year I have been fortunate to have four paintings juried in.
One of these paintings, “Urban Serenity” above, won a 2nd place award at the 2009 Denver Plein Air Show held in December, and another,
“Quiet Sunday at the Bail Bonds” an honorable mention the year before.
“Greenland Ranch Buildings” I just painted this past February,
 and ”Alley in Fall” was the start of my fascination with alleys, when I painted it from my alley across the street last October.

The thing I find interesting about this is a year ago I thought myself a landscape painter. The only painting I submitted that did not get in to this show was a landscape. I did not think I was very good at painting cityscapes in particular, and buildings in general. In fact, I only submitted two paintings I did at a garden center (flowers are “safe”) to the 2009 Denver Plein Air Juried show, not thinking the cityscapes I did were very good at all.

It rained off and on all day; Light showers mixed with heavy downpours with a patch or two of dry. BUT I enjoyed it more than I would have expected. It got chilly, but amazingly, the weather did not diminish the attendance by as much as I would have expected. LOTS of traffic to our tent. I changed my modus operandi this year, putting my best work on the walls and better work in the bins, which raised some prices overall. Probably not the wisest thing to do in this economy, but I could not afford to give my work away. I don't produce just for the market like some of the artists do. I did not sell very much, in fact, nothing bigger than a 6x9,  but the positive response, and amount of people who stopped to look was worth it. PLUS, I got the best thing an artist in this area could hope for, and that is a master artist came in, said my alley painting was the first painting to draw him into a booth; that he always wanted to paint alleys, but just never has, and what a great painting my alley was; then he looked at Smokin" and said, wonderful expression with little detail; then he asked what gallery I showed in. And I had to say I was not in a gallery. Anyway, that was worth all the rain.
More rain is forecast for all day today, with thunderstorms thrown in for good measure. I am adding a layer or two, taking towels for the condensation that comes into the tent and hangs over the art work. I did hear a few tents went down on Friday night, but I did not hang until yesterday morning. I took all my hanging work down and brought it home last night as well. My bin work is in covered plastic bins, so they should be good. Drew, whom I am sharing the booth with, had a few paintings on boards warp, but the watercolorists are the ones who took the biggest hit. Even without direct contact, they were warping just from all the moisture.