Last night, George, Linda, Duane, and I attended an art event to benefit the Arts Council of Hillsborough County’s individual artist programs. This is the fourth year the event has been held but the first time any of us had attended. George and Duane both donated art. George sent two of his photographs and Duane donated a painting. The rules for this event are basically that the art must by 5" x 5" in size and if it's three dimensional, the depth can't be over 5 inches. There is no entry fee for the artists who donate and each artist may donate up to two pieces. Each piece of art is priced at $25 and the artist is not known to the buyer until after it's been purchased. Admittance is free to contributing artists and is $10 per person for everyone else.
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| Duane and George -- our two artistes. |
Since this was our first year of involvement in this event, we discovered the hard way that you need to get there early -- well before the 8pm opening -- and stand in line for the doors to open. Because the art was available to view online, I'm sure many people had their hearts set on certain pieces. I know I did but the place was literally packed by the time we got there -- at almost 9pm. Duane's son had been there before it opened and he said the line was very long and you could barely get up close to see the art due to a crush of people craning their necks to see what they wanted to purchase. Because I'm short and a bit claustrophobic in crowds, I'm not sure how I would handle that. It was still very crowded when we went in despite many of the pieces having been sold. Have to wait and see next year.
Happily, both of George's photos and Duane's painting sold. Here are their entries:
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| UT by George Howlett |
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| Wig by George Howlett |
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| Gulls over choppy water by Duane K. Reigel |
You can't tell from these pics but Duane's painting was a bit three dimensional. It consisted of drywall with drywall mud, acrylic paint, and seagulls made of blank card catalog card stock. (She just knew those cards would come in handy someday...)
Duane and I each purchased art, too. I bought two photographs. Here they are:
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| The Old Window by Neil Sperling |
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| Optical Theatre by Stephanie Schulte |
Duane's purchase was fairly thick and was described as 'felted eco print.' Here are two pics to give you an idea of the size and texture:
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| Flirt of Fall by Barbara Kazanis |
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| Duane holding Flirt of Fall -- a thick piece |
We're really looking forward to next year's show. It's such a great cause and a wonderful opportunity to purchase art at a very low price while benefiting working artists. I don't know who purchased George's UT pic but I did speak with the woman who bought the Wig picture. She's a gallery owner in Tampa so we know it's going to a nice place. I should also mention that entries were welcome from all over the world, not just locally. I think my favorite part was not knowing who the artist was and just selecting a piece because I liked it. I tend to purchase art that way, anyway, and we found out after our purchases were made. There was an alphabetical list of the artists and their locations on the FIVE BY FIVE homepage. Also, all of the artists in attendance wore special stickers like Duane and George are wearing in the picture above.
'Til next year!
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