Anna Buchanan is the juror and leads two workshops.
The Virginia Highlands Festival’s Juried Fine Art Show combines both adult entries and youth entries for an exhibition at The Arts Depot, Abingdon, Virginia. The exhibition is open to the public at 5:15 p.m., Friday, July 26. The Awards Ceremony and Juror’s Remarks are given by this year’s juror Anna Buchanan at 5:30 p.m. The show runs through Sunday, Aug. 4, closing at 5 p.m.
Central to the festival from its beginning were art shows and sales, art demonstrations and art classes. Early art shows were held at the Martha Washington Inn, sometimes of works from private collections and sometimes from the Virginia Museum of Art. The first amateur art shows were called Clothesline Art Shows where paintings were pinned to a clothesline for the week of the festival, and then auctioned on the last day.
These early shows evolved into the most prestigious art show in the region, with hundreds of entries and thousands of dollars in prizes. During much of the festival’s history, there were both art and photography contests, but in recent years the two contests have merged, to reflect photography’s place among the arts. A photograph recently won “Best in Show” in the Juried Fine Arts competition.
The exhibition of paintings in oil, acrylic, watercolor and other mediums continue to be at the forefront of the show. Darkroom and digital photography are again included in the fine art exhibition, competing along with other two-dimensional mediums including paintings, drawings and printmaking. Digital works on paper are also being accepted.
Curator Joe Champagne of the McGlothlin Center for the Arts at Emory & Henry College chairs this 75th anniversary exhibition. He is a photographic artist and has also taught classes in dark room and digital photography and web design at the college.
Champagne has selected Curator Anna Buchanan of William King Museum of Arts to serve as juror for the combined exhibition. Buchanan offers two workshops during the Virginia Highlands Festival.
Awards in the adult category are $2,000 for Best in Show, $1,500 for first place, $1,000 for second place, $500 for third place, $500 for people’s choice and $250 for honorable mentions. The Youth awards are $100 for first place, $75 for second place, $50 for third place, and $25 for honorable mention.
A non-refundable entry fee of $20 is required for adults entering up to three submissions and a $5 entry fee for youth entering up to three admissions. Drop-off dates for entries are 2-5 p.m., Saturday, July 20 and Sunday, July 21, at The Arts Depot.
For entry forms, visit www.vahighlandsfestival.com/ juried-fine-art-show.
The Virginia Highlands Festival Fine Art Show’s juror Anna Buchanan leads two workshops during the Virginia Highlands Festival at the William King Museum of Art, Abingdon, Virginia.
The first workshop is “Painting with Watercolor: An Approach to Cubism,” held Tuesday, July 30 from 2-4 p.m. in the Red Table Room on the first floor of the museum. Discuss the fundamentals of art and design using watercolor techniques and go over a bit of history about abstract and cubist movements while you create a masterpiece of your own. Supplies are provided. $20, advance registration required. Limited to 15 participants.
The second workshop is “How to Make a Panel: A Cost-effective Solution to Framing” on Thursday, Aug. 1 from 2-4 p.m. in the Red Table Room on the museum’s first floor.
Learn how to create a wooden panel, which provides the artist with a solid surface that maintains the integrity of the paper or ground and is a gallery-quality, cost-effective alternative to framing artwork. Whether planning on creating wooden panels in the future or purchasing them from suppliers, the artist must know how to properly adhere paper to a panel in an archival fashion so that it does not damage the artwork. Supplies are provided. $30, advance registration required. Limited to 10 participants.
Buchanan is the Curator of Contemporary Fine Art and Craft at the William King Museum of Art. In the last four years, Buchanan has curated over 15 exhibitions and served as a juror for several regional art shows. She has worked in galleries and museums for 11 years.
“I have loved art and drawing as long as I can remember,” explains Buchanan. “I grew up in Midland, Michigan, and spent my summers visiting family in Grayson, Kentucky. My mother would take me to a small museum close to our house, and we always had the best time. My mother loves impressionism, and she had prints in our home of Mary Cassatt’s work. When I began drawing, I tried to copy the prints that my mother had, cartoons that I watched, or patterns on the floral couch. I learned to draw by observation,” she says.
In 2016, Buchanan realized a need to revamp art programs in her community and developed an arts outreach organization called Arts2Grow on her college campus. Arts2Grow reached out to local Girl Scout troops and Masonic homes and partnered with the Alma Community Arts Center to revitalize art within the area. Through art and activism, Buchanan hoped to get people thinking about the ways they can make an impact in their own communities.
