Winter Park - Here I Come!

I feel like I’m back in high school waiting hoping for the fat envelope instead of the skinny envelope from the college of my choice. Remember that time? The fat envelope meant there were lots of forms and information inside and that meant you were accepted? The skinny envelope meant that letter that always said something about the “high number of qualified applicants” and you were rejected. Art show applications are the opposite. I want the skinny envelope, without the slides in it. That means I got accepted or at least waitlisted. Upon pulling the self –addressed stamped envelope from the mailbox I immediately press down on it to see if there are slides in it. Tonight I got the skinny envelope from Winter Park Autumn Arts Festival. Woo Hoo! I’m in. After three years of applications I’ve been accepted for my first visit to Central Park in Winter Park, Florida. It’s Oct. 13 – 14. Come see me if you can.

http://www.winterparkartfestival.com/

Speaking of Winter Park - Don't forget the Open House at the Winter Park Public Library in the Community Room this Sunday! If you can't make it Sunday, the pictures are up already and will be until Aug. 31st.

http://www.wppl.org/

Application Time (cont.)

Well the first of the results are in and not good so far. Festival of the Masters came in with a rejection and well in advance of their advertised notification date. Which means I didn’t even get a “maybe”? Darn! I really thought my work would do well there. And to get the rejection the very day I spent all day at Disney's Animal Kingdom taking photographs (Komodo Dragon above). Oh well. Now I’m doubly not happy with Disney. Several years ago I applied to be one of their artists at the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival. They responded with, “Pick a weekend in April that you would like to do and we will get back to you.” Then closer to the festival I got an email from them looking for plein air artists for the festival. I responded back with the “pick a weekend” email, inquiring about which weekend they wanted me to come, and got a rather rude reply. Basically it said “don’t you know what a plein air artist is?” Of course I do! (Had to look it up ;), it’s an artist who paints on site). Apparently the person who chose the artists for the festival during the year had changed and the previous person’s invitations were ignored. On a sour grapes note, a friend of mine went to the Epcot festival this year and, in her opinion, with the exception of Clyde Butcher, the photographs were not nearly as good as mine. So Disney – phhhtt. Of course I’ll apply next year. This is the Festival of the Masters (something about that name) we’re talking about. But I’ll also apply to Gainesville, and should I get into both, who knows?

So this leaves me with two extra days of vacation to spend on another art festival. A quick look at my spreadsheet of available shows gives me the choice of Bonita Springs or Cape Coral in January. Their bold listings in the spreadsheet tell me that both of them are in the top 200 art shows in the country. Of to Sunshine Artists magazine which tells me that Bonita Springs is #5 and Cape Coral is #48. That puts Bonita Springs ahead. But does that mean Cape Coral might be easier to get into? Now they’re even. A quick check of location tells me that they are both on the west coast of Florida near Ft. Myers. No deciding factor there. Off to the Art Fair Source Book. AFSB confirms my theory that Bonita Springs is going to be harder to get into, 1 in 4 chance, vs. a 1 in 2 chance for Cape Coral. But drilling down into the details, Bonita Springs, even with fewer exhibitors, has more photographers. Interesting. And AFSB is not kind, to say the least, in their comments on Cape Coral. The final deciding factor – Cape Coral wants all their money up front, and then they’ll refund my booth fee if I don’t get in. Three hundred dollars of my money would be out of circulation for several months. This is not the time of year I can afford that. Bonita Springs, here I come, hopefully.

Art show application time....

It’s that time of year again, the time of year where I puzzle over the spring applications. Fall is fairly easy. There are 9 shows all within reasonable distance. Two of them overlap with another show so there are two decisions to make. All the others are pretty straightforward. The only difficult decision was between the “Downtown Festival and Art Show” in Gainesville and the “Disney Festival of the Masters”. Gators fans are in Gainesville and my photograph “Morning in the Glades” is big with Gators fans. Someone taught me this saying at Lake Mary last year – God must love the Gators, too, because He made the sun orange and the sky blue. And “Morning in the Glades” has got it all, orange sun, blue sky reflected in the water, and, of course, the gator. They would love me in Gainesville, I just know it.

On the other hand, I’ve always dreamed of doing Disney. There’s something about that name, “Festival of the Masters” that just calls to an artist. In order to apply to Disney I have to have won a major award within the past three years. I qualify this year. I can’t always count on that. And on the practical note – Gainesville is further away and I would need a hotel. So Disney it is.

But I was going to talk about the spring season. What a mess! Three top 100 shows all on the same weekend. Luckily they are all on ZAPP. And then every single weekend from January through March has double, triple, and in one case quadruple shows on the same weekend. This is just shows in Florida!

The majority of art shows use one of two methods to receive applications. The first is by mail. You send in the application and two checks. The first check is for the application or jurying fee and the second is for your booth fee. If you are accepted, they cash your booth fee. Unless I’m willing to lose a booth fee should I get into both shows, I don’t double apply. That’s been the story with the three top 100 shows the past three years. Either apply to all three and risk looking at a $1200 deficit before I even get in the van or cross my fingers and pick one. The cross my fingers and pick one method has not worked for me so far.

But now all of the three are on ZAPP. ZAPP is a method of applying over the internet and you don’t pay the booth fee until you get accepted. So I spring for three jurying fees and hope for one acceptance. Of course, the downside of ZAPP is that I am not the only one who is going to do that.

Then there’s the show that I already applied for that I didn’t realize is on the same weekend as another show that I did last year and would really like to do again. The last date for canceling the first show and being able to get my money back is exactly one day before the second show will notify me of acceptance or rejection. That’s got to be a double apply.

The idea of double applying really bothers me. But I’ve learned it is a necessary evil. My first year doing shows, I had the choice to apply to a benefit show for a local wildlife rescue or a top 100 show. Because of who I am and what I stand for there was no question that the choice had to be the benefit show. And being so idealistic I didn’t even apply to the other show. They cancelled the benefit show. There I was, all dressed up with nowhere to go.

On another note, I just got my new flash purchased in preparation for a friend’s wedding. I’ve been playing with it and got a couple nice pictures of Tank, our Bengal cat.

I came home last night to find this guy on my front lawn. At first I thought it was a gopher turtle but a quick google for images of gopher turtles did not come up with anything looking like this one. Anybody know what kind of turtle it is?

Featured Photograph 6/16/2007

If some of my photographs are more favorite than others, this is the favorite. It is hanging in my grandson’s room. It was sent as a donation to a silent auction for a co-worker whose son was critically injured in a canoeing accident. It probably will be one of my first editions to sell out. It says serenity and peace to me. And it is of one of my favorite animals, the cat, the panther.

Unfortunately it is not a Florida panther. Florida panthers are very rare and very endangered. It is also, unlike the majority of my photographs, a captive panther.

Her name was Sheaba. She went to live at Grandfather Mountain after she grew too large and too wild to be someone’s pet. She was graceful and she was beautiful and she has now passed on to a better world. I just discovered this while doing some research for this blog and so I don’t think I’ll write anything else today.

http://www.grandfather.com/about/archive/sheaba.php

The phone rang at 10:30PM. The caller-id number was 999-999-9999. That’s a new one, better answer that. So began my first experience with a reverse 911 call. My husband picked up the phone and then turned on the speaker in time for me to hear – “at this time there is no need for further evacuation but we urge people in the area to prepare for the possibility.” A brush fire has come close.

One thing I’ve found about moving to Florida is that it puts you into real contact with nature. Back when I lived in northern Virginia (basically Washington D.C.) I had the opportunity to visit Kansas. I was talking to a person there about tornados and why exactly one would live in Kansas and he said “I guess every area of the country has its weather issues, what do you have in D.C?” Uhmmm, traffic? Seriously, traffic is really bad in D.C. and every once in a while we would get a snowstorm that would paralyze the city for a few days and cause people with bald tires to think they had 4-wheel drive, but for the most part, weather isn’t really all that noticeable there.

But it is noticeable here. Today, Barry the tropical storm has come to visit. The fires are out.