 |
Header image: Dizzy City, by Daniel Roache |
Fairs & Festivals
Last updated: September 1, 2011
2011 Sault Summer Arts Festival—Awards and Sum Up
We had a really good festival this year!!
It looked good starting out: good judge; a balanced, high quality slate of exhibitors; an excellent alternate site. There was the problem of the streets being all torn up, but the City Engineer furnished us with a map of the construction, we copied it, marked the easiest route to the Courthouse, and sent a copy to all the exhibitors.
Everything looked great until the weather forecast changed drastically and promised strong winds and thunder storms with hard rain and possible hail. Ooops! Well, with the exception of the hail, the forecast was correct, and yet the festival turned out to be one of the best we’ve ever had. The reason? People: Exhibitors who took it all in stride and simply waited out the rain, spending the time talking to one another. Nobody got grouchy and nobody complained. Sault citizens who took cover during the worst of it but were right back, happily shopping as soon as it started to let up. And our own volunteer staff who simply pitched in and carried on. The result was a great festival and happy exhibitors. Thank you all.
We had a lot of youngsters attending this year. One of them, Jesse Gerard, found a wallet and promptly turned it in at our booth. Not a half hour later it was claimed by a very happy, grateful little girl.
Garry Smith’s beautiful tiered wooden bowl from our shop, that we raffled, was won by Mary June.
Our judge, Helga Flower, went around to all the exhibitors and presented all the awards personally. The winners were:
OLIVE CRAIG BEST OF SHOW AWARD ($300): Maureen Mousley (above). A multi-media artist, Mousley has taken the Best Painting Award in the Sault Summer Arts Festival seven times over the years, the Fine Arts Award three times and the Design Award once. She took the Best of Show Award for her baskets in 1994.
In between Sault awards, she has taken top painting awards all over the state and in Sault, Ontario. Among her other top awards were First Place in the “On the Waterfront” Juried Exhibition in Alberta House in 2001 for an oil painting and another First Place for a hooked rug set in the April 2010 Olive Craig Gallery’s juried show, “Folk Art Folks”.
Maureen teaches art at Lake Superior State University and we keep her really busy at Alberta House where she is a frequent volunteer, juror, hanger of shows and in charge of display in the shop. She also helped Gary Deuman plot out festival sites.
The one-hundred-fifty-dollar Best of Crafts Award was taken by metal worker and jewelry artist Sergio Barcena of Grosse Pointe Farms (above).
Sergio won the SSAF Best of Show Award in both 2005 and 2008, and has taken the jewelry award multiple times. Barcena displays bracelets that combine smooth leather work with sterling silver and has a large and varied assortment of metal wall art as well.
He has donated both a metal butterfly, ready to hang, and a silver and leather bracelet for our October 8, Art Auction (see the 2011 Auction page for photos). The Best of Crafts Award is given by the EUP Craftsmen and National Office Products.
Jeanne Tubman (above), just back from winning the top painting award in the Cheboygan Art Festival, took the one-hundred-fifty-dollar Best Painting Award here for the second year in a row.
Tubman is a Sault artist, an oil painter working in the photo-realistic style, who is best known for her marine and nature paintings. You can frequently see her painting in the Locks area, where unlike many artists, she welcomes onlookers. She’s a SAAC board member, a Le Sault Artists Guild member and an enthusiastic booster of other artists.
The Best Painting Award is given by the Le Sault Artists Guild and the Art Store.
The seventy-five-dollar Judge’s Choice Award, which is given by an anonymous donor, went to Tammy Beacom, a festival newcomer. Beacom (right) is a Sault artist who makes vintage inspired necklaces and earrings.
She has donated a lovely necklace and earring set for our auction (see the 2011 Auction page). You can see more of her work in the Alberta House Shop.
The following are fifty-dollar awards (all photos are below): Renate Favour of Traverse City, won the Aarre Lahti Design Award. Favour’s creations are smile provoking—funny, whimsical, lightweight and delicate. The Aarre Lahti Award is given by the Sault Area Arts Council in honor of the artist and art professor who established and, until his death, funded it—Aarre Lahti. Some will remember him as the strolling violinist at many early festivals. The last time he played for us was at one of the early festivals at the Locks.
It sounds as if the festival had a lot of jewelers this year, and so it did, all of them different and many of them local. The Jewelry Award went to a team of jewelers from Fenton, Michigan, Clair Rettenmund and Paul Baker. New to the festival, they combine their talents to create multi-media jewelry that often incorporates miniature paintings or photographs. They’ve donated two pendants for our auction. See p. 16. Ryan’s Jewelry gives the Jewelry Award.
Sault Artist David Bigelow has won an award every single year he has been in the festival and this year is no exception: he took the Graphics Award, given by Kevin Cooper, D.D.S. Among his many works are pen-and-ink drawings of area landmarks, many of them on note cards. If you missed the display, you can find his work in a number of area shops, including Alberta House, where you may find him volunteering. Dave is the one who put out all the festival signs in so many excellent locations.
The Pottery Award, given by the Soo Co-op Credit Union, was won by William Hagerty of Wetmore, Michigan. Hagerty specializes in ovenware; every pot, bowl and casserole in his display can be put in the oven. The light color, (many blues, whites and beiges) and smooth surfaces of the pieces belie their weight, but this pottery was made to be used. Hagerty has been in six Sault Summer Arts Festivals and has won the Pottery Award in three of them. We have his pottery in the Alberta House Shop, and he has donated a blue and white bread bowl (bake in the bowl), complete with recipe, for our October 8th Art Auction (see the 2011 Auction page).
Sault carver Larry Gilbert took the Wood Award, given by local attorney James Lambros. Gilbert, a retired Sault teacher who carves and paints realistically supple fish, won the Best of Show when he first appeared in the festival a number of years ago. Last year he debuted his newest offerings—carving kits which included all materials and instructions so a beginner could carve and paint his own fish.
The Yvonne Peer Glass Award went to Craig Weatherby for a beautiful display of blown glass. Weatherby won the Glass award in both 2008 and 2010 and took the Best of Show in 2009. He is from Adrian, Michigan, but summers in Epoufette.
The award for Best Display went to iron worker Paul Mason, of Kimball, Michigan, for a wide ranging display of lawn and wall ornaments. This is Mason’s second visit to the Sault Summer Arts Festival. This Award, created and initially funded by the late Paul D. Freedman, is given by local attorney Mark L. Dobias.
This year’s festival was outstanding in its variety and quality and the judge gave three Honorable Mention Awards—one to multi-media painter Sandra Ledy, of Drummond Island; one to ceramic artist Carole Meier of Grayling, and one to frequent award winner and 2006 Best of Show winner, Zoey Wood-Salomon of Sault, Ontario. Carol Meier has donated several sets of ceramic wind chimes for our auction and Zoey has donated a framed watercolor painting, “Picking Sweetgrass”.
The judge was nationally known artist and teacher, Helga Flower (shown right with Treasurer Jim Halvorsen and his daughter Lauren), who took time from a very busy schedule for the task and was totally unfazed by the weather. Al Beamish went with her when she presented awards and took the photos you see here. Jim Halvorsen presented the checks. (Jim also set up our canopy, hauled all our “stuff”, including boxes of sweatshirts and tee shirts and coffee urn, to and from the festival, made a run for more doughnuts and generally made things a lot easier for all of us.)
There are always many, many to thank for a big, non-profit, volunteer venture such as the Sault Summer Arts Festival, but the list required for this particular festival has reached epic proportions. The city of Sault Ste. Marie found the alternate site for us, furnished the construction maps and garbage cans and, in general, made things a whole lot easier for us. An unidentified worker in a city truck guided a confused exhibitor through the maze of construction all the way to Courthouse. The county graciously allowed the use of their grounds for the festival. Lee Brown, of the Downtown Development found the answers to all the questions we had about parking and grounds and more.
David Bigelow put up (and took down) all our festival signs and a number of Sault Board members handed out festival posters. Gary Deuman (right, with official festival “gofer Michael Tadgerson), as he does every year, plotted out all the sites, met exhibitors who wanted to set up early the afternoon before and was there at 6:30 a.m. on Tuesday to site the rest, assisted by Maureen Mousley and Jeanne Conlin. He’s shown right with official festival “gofer” Michael Tadgerson. Tedi Selke originated, set up and organized the children’s art tent, assisted by Ginny Johnson, Sue Johnson and Erica Lewinski. Co-ed Flower and Gifts furnished the balloons for the children in the SAAC art tent, for the second year in a row.
Joan Gerrie, Judy Furr, Pat Claxton, Mary Barry and Kym Inabinet worked at our SAAC desk. Pat Claxton also took care of ordering our spiffy new festival tee shirts, sweat shirts, and totes (now in the Alberta House Shop). Kym and Ed Inabinet also stayed late to pack up and close our booth and Jim Halvorsen lugged everything back to Alberta House. And Kathy Dailey secured permission from War Memorial for the use of their dumpster and then, with son Michael Tadgerson, policed the post-festival grounds, emptied all the garbage cans, and transported all the trash. (And while we hate to make a list like this because there were so many people involved and doing so much that it’s impossible not to leave somebody out, we’re very grateful for all the enthusiastic help that made the festival possible.)
Sault International Arts Festival
Once again, the creativity and talents of two nations will be showcased over three months thanks to one summer-long event – the Sault International Arts Festival.
Publicity for all festival events should display the festival logo. The official versions (one in English and one in French) are shown below. To save a copy, right-click on the image and select "Save Image As..." or "Save Picture As..."
|
Logo for
Sault International Arts Festival Format: jpg Size: 417 x 274 pixels Filesize: 17 kb
|
|
Logo for Sault International Arts Festival Format: jpg Size: 417 x 274 pixels Filesize: 17 kb |
Sault Area Arts Council Home
Page
217 Ferris Street, Sault Ste. Marie, MI 49783
e-mail: saac@saultarts.org Phone: (906) 635-1312