Mangrove
20x24
acrylic on canvas
Good Morning. Enjoyed a wonderful reception at the Marco Island Center for the Arts last night for artist Diane Eiler. Diane shares my love of the Everglades landscape. She's raised three boys with a lot of Everglades activities and camping, so is quite familiar with the back country. She'll be teaching a three week class this summer, so if you're interested, call the Art League and sign up soon!
It was delightful to see such a nice crowd for this time of year, with a great group of people in "Save the Art League" mode. Giving the board permission to list and sell the extra lot was a tough decision. Questions and suggestions brought out how much this difficult economy has affected the Center, and that the board had reviewed other options, had a plan, and needed to get this done. The vote by members passed with a large majority.
The board of the Marco Island Foundation for the Arts had to make the tough financial decision that ArtQuest 2010 would have to be postponed. There's a nice article about that announcement in today's Marco Island Eagle. It's too bad that in a difficult economy art is one of the first things to take a hit. ArtQuest would have been great family fun at no cost. We'll just look forward to the future!
We had a light dinner with a group of artists after the reception last night, and I was very pleased to hear how I've inspired photographer Jack Megala. He told me that when he first saw my paintings he didn't understand where the color came from, but seeing my work and spending time in the Everglades over several years he now sees the depth of color and season. His photographs are superior, the more so because he uses a film and a large format camera, so he has to catch all his colors on film rather than use an enhancement program. He's waited hours for a small cloud to move just into the right position for the reflection to be perfect!
