Part two: art show

After I left the dog show, I spent some time taking wrong turns and driving around trying to find the town square in Medina where the art show was being held (side note- apparently half the streets out there don't have street signs, so I had to do a LOT of guessing). Once I made it there I parked and started wandering around the show.

The Medina art show is laid out in neat spokes from the center gazebo in the town square. Makes it easy to walk the whole show without getting lost or skipping booths, but it also means the paths are crowded. And people always seem to stop and admire something or have a conversation right in the middle of the path in front of me instead of stepping out of the traffic flow first. *sigh* Can you get road-rage when you are on foot I wonder? :)

Anyway, I was going to the show to see the art, and also partially as a scouting mission. I am trying to decide what shows make sense for me to apply to for next year. In general this show seemed to be a good quality one. There were a couple jewelers that looked like they might be 'commercial-bead' varieties (though I may be wronging them- I am not a jewelry expert), but there was a lot of high-end work in many different media as well. I didn't get a good feel for how many people were actually selling consistently (other than the jewelers) though- it felt more like a family festival sort of crowd rather than an art-buying one. Oh well, will have to get that art festival analysis guide to be sure I guess...


Two booths in particular really jumped out at me as far as quality work that is a bit different from the norm..

There were a pair of women from Colorado who did some beautiful intaglio and printmaking work- Julie Hasenfratz and Gerd Anton. One of my favorite pieces here was a maybe 14"x36" (REALLY rough estimate) framed piece, framed in a brown wood burl finish. It was a 4-opening mat if I remember right, and each opening had a single leaf in it. The leaves were embossed into the paper and colored with beautiful metallic inks. Other than the inks, the rest of the colors on the piece were simple and neutral. The artists didn't have a website unfortunately, and this piece wasn't price labelled that I could see, but I may try to email them for a picture of the piece and a price (since I need to get agreement from someone else before buying expensive pieces of art to hang in our house)..

Also there was a local man- James Yager- who did Chinese ball woodturnings with balls or shapes inside pierced balls, carved free so they move around independently without coming out from the inside. Beautiful work here as well!!