Weekend in a Chicago white tent

This was an art festival that I was determined to be a part of even though fate seemed to think otherwise after the windstorm the weekend before crushed some paintings and twisted some tent parts. Miraculously–or so it seemed–I was able to order the tent parts on Monday and receive them on Wednesday. I couldn’t wait longer because Thursday was Independence Day holiday and Friday I had to be in Chicago to set up for the preview show that evening. I was also able to repair the crushed frames and to my surprise the canvases themselves had no damage whatsoever. So here’s my booth at the Chicago Botanical Garden Art Festival in Glencoe, Illinois.

You can see a portion of the left front tent leg which wasn’t exactly perpendicular to the ground. The corner piece that fastens the leg to the roof was the one part I didn’t notice was bent. Lucky for me it wasn’t bent so much as to be useless!

We had a terrific crowd all three days. Sunday, which has a habit of being a rather slow day at most art fairs, was probably the busiest one of all. There were several steps up to one of the garden buildings at one end of my row, and a lake with a fountain at the other end. I climbed the steps to get this shot of the crowd, which was pretty typical most of the time during the three days.

You can’t see much of my tent, but it was the third one down on the right. There were eight lines of tents in all.

Some of my readers may remember that I received an award for outstanding achievement in oil painting at the Barrington Art Festival back in May. Never did I expect to be so honored again. I watched as the festival promoter walked down my row announcing awards, fully expecting her to pass right on by me…when she made a sharp left turn and announced my name and handed me another of those hard-won ribbons…

Award for outstanding achievement in oil painting

The last day in the last moments of the show the event was capped off by a sale! A couple came in and spent considerable time looking, discussing, asking questions, looking some more, discussing some more. Normally after making a very short introductory statement about my art and answering questions I try to make myself scarce. By that I mean that I generally stay in the neighborhood but I might busy myself straightening out crooked paintings or smiling and chatting with passersby, or, in this case sidling over to the booth next door where I could chat but still keep looking out of the corner of my eye at what appeared to be some serious discussion going on with the couple. Sort of like granting privacy in a public space. As I wandered back they came right out and said we want to buy this painting…

Sky Pads 17

Since this one is one of my top two favorites I was overjoyed to see that they had chosen something I myself am in love with!

As a bonus, my booth was also visited by a couple of interior designers looking for a new painting source. They said they were happy to find something that didn’t look so much like most of the art they see every time they come to one of these festivals. And they already had in mind some possible paintings for one of their clients. We’ll have to see what the future brings on that one. It would be great to have a relationship with a business that you know loves your work.

All’s well that ends well!