Excellent art is abundant here in our part of the world. No surprise there. Artists love to live here. Create here. Maybe it’s the air; maybe it’s the light; maybe it’s just who we are. But sometimes artists need someone else to provide a venue for their work to be seen. That’s where the Sidney Fine Art Show offers a great opportunity for artists to show their work to the public. We welcome everyone from the reticent first-timer to the established professional.
It’s a big job to organize an art show. It takes dedicated people, a huge amount of time and, inevitably, a healthy budget. The ArtSea Community Arts Council’s mandate is to support local artists and the Sidney Fine Art Show is their biggest event of the year. It is organized and managed entirely by volunteers.
The most difficult challenge is how to select the art for the show. This year we received the highest number of entries since the show began in 2003 – 480 artists with nearly 1,150 pieces.
The Show organizers invite three professional jurors to adjudicate the art. They are confirmed at least a year in advance and selected based on renown, accreditation, curatorial experience and previous jurying credits. And they have only one full day to view and score every piece of art. This year the jurors are Cindy Gibson, ceramicist, Tristram Lansdowne, painter, and Heather Wheeler, owner of The Avenue Gallery.
Adjudication takes place in early September, about a month before the Show, and requires over 100 volunteers to make it happen. All the artwork is identified only by number, not by artist’s name. The jurors arrive when all the artwork has been physically checked in. (No digital submissions are taken). It can be overwhelming to see so much art assembled in one place.
Each juror independently views and adjudicates the art as a volunteer scribe notes the scores. Scoring is scaled from one to five, with five the highest score for excellence. Jurors do not consult with each other or compare notes during this process. It’s a demanding task but, by the end of the day, every piece will have received a score from all three jurors.
Scores for each piece are compiled for a composite total. The highest total possible is 15, receiving a top score of five from each of the three jurors. The highest scoring artwork is then assembled for the jurors to consult together to select the winning pieces in each of the prize categories.
The following day, all the art is returned to the artists. And a few days after that, artists are notified if their work has been successfully chosen to appear in the Show.
Come and see the results at the Sidney Fine Art Show, October 18 to 20, 2019 at the Mary Winspear Centre, Sidney, B.C.
You may choose to become a patron for the opportunity to be the first to view and purchase the art at our exclusive Preview evening Thursday, October 17. Visit our website at www.sidneyfineartshow.ca for more information.
From left: Best 3 Dimensional – “Sailing Away” by Karin Schieber; Best in Show – “Chinese Dream” by Evguenia Ioganov; Juror Choice Award – “Three Vessels” by Debbie Katz; Juror Choice Award – “Let’s Snuggle Up” by Maureen Walker; Juror Choice Award – “Winston” by Karen Lancey.
