It is now May and Artsfest is officially over. In some ways I am glad to be done but in other ways I am already looking forward to the next festival if for no other reason than I enjoy spending part of 3 days with my dear friends Bridget and Andy.

This time around we made some significant improvements over Cider Days. The 3 biggest being that we each had own own space, new tents (with sides to protect our stuff from rain!), and I made some display panels from which I could hang some larger sized framed prints. I also brought more (and better) framed prints. I am still learning but this year was infinitely smoother than Cider Days. I was also excited to have won the “Best of Show 2D Category”. Personally I saw lots of other artists with stuff that I felt was far superior to mine, but nevertheless it was exciting and encourages me to keep doing it.

At any rate, Artsfest was a success and lots of fun in the process!!

Tomorrow (thursday) is the first Joplin Artwalk of 2010 and I will have a couple photos on display. Mine can be found at a new hot dog place on the 500 Block of Main, just a few doors down from where I was last time.

It’s supposed to be nice out tomorrow, so this will be a great excuse to get out and enjoy it. I am not sure what the official hours are but I would guess roughly 6 – 8pm.

Thanks to everyone who came out to our gallery at the Joplin Artwalk last night. Considering we were a ‘rogue’ gallery and not officially a part of the artwalk event, we had tons of visitors. In fact at times there was barely room to stand, which was very cool!

I had a great time just mingling among friends, family, and random people who were out enjoying the evening and checking out some art in the process. Definitely a fun thing, and I hope to be able to do it again in the future!! The only problem was that in all the excitement I forgot to take any photos once the event got rolling. Luckily this one was snapped when Lindsay and Kim stopped by right before things started.

I am pleased to announce that my photography will be featured at October’s artwalk in Joplin – which is this Thursday (15th), roughly from 6-8pm!

I will be sharing a space with Jason Shelfer at 515 S. Main and I think his wife may do some light catering of the event. So I have been very busy the last few days getting my stuff ready for my first official ’show’ here in Joplin. I think i’ll have about 15 of my favs nicely framed and on display. It’s totally last minute so our gallery may not be as fancy as some of the others, but I am sure our works will not disappoint!

Anyways, I hope everyone comes out and stops by!

The Maple Leaf Bike Ride is coming up on Saturday, Oct 10. I would like to encourage everyone to come out and participate. Last year me, shelf-life, mom, and dad all did it and had a blast. I would also like to point out that I had the distinction of finishing dead last in my distance category (74miles).

Here are a few reasons I think you should do it:

• Riding bikes is fun!
• Proceeds go to the construction of new area trails!
• Those are really the main two reasons I can think of.

There are routes for riders of all abilities… anywhere from 15mi for the casual rider up to 100 miles for the people with legs of steel and $6000 bikes. Mom and dad did the 35mile route and thoroughly enjoyed it. I like the 70-80ish mile routes. Regardless of which route you choose, it’s lots of fun to get out and support area trail projects!

Here is the website with all the info and online registration:
http://www.carthagemapleleafride.com/

In spite of a very rocky start on Saturday and modest turnout on Sunday, I felt like Cider Days was a success and I think Bridget felt the same! I sold several prints and enjoyed the numerous compliments and encouragement I received. We learned a LOT about what we could do better next time and I enjoyed fraternizing with the other photographers who were ‘peddling’ their work. Here are a few highlights (and lowlights) from the weekend…

Here is Bridget’s mother helping us put the finishing touches on our booth saturday morning. We managed to cram a lot of stuff into a small area.

The festival opened at 10:00am, at approximately 9:57 it started raining. Initially the forecast did not call for rain and our tent did not have sides…so saying we were ill-prepared would be an understatement. Our booth, and some of my photos were basically ruined before the show even started.

I estimate that it rained for appoximately 5 of the 7 hours of Cider Days on Saturday, but thanks to some quick help by Bridget’s mom we improvised some tarp sides, keeping most of our stuff fairly dry for the remainder of the show.

Things took a turn for the better when we were awarded the “best regional artist”. We were pretty stoked to display our award. All in all it was a lot of fun spending the day showing off and occasionally selling my work. And most of all just spending time with good friends.