Georgia painter wins top award at 2016 Bluff Park Art Show
A painter from Georgia today won the best in show award for the 2016 Bluff Park Art Show.
Sidney Carter of Powder Springs, Georgia, received $3,500 for winning the Bluff Park Art Association Permanent Collection Purchase Award for one of his paintings called “The Harvest.” It was one of 15 awards given out at the 53rd annual show at the Bluff Park Community Center.
Organizers said they were very happy with turnout for the event and the sunny, pleasant weather — a vast improvement over the rain that plagued the show last year.
Crowd totals at the show are difficult to estimate, but Bluff Park Art Association President Tommy Sanderson said the show typically draws 8,000 to 10,000 people on a good weather day like today.
Plus, art sales seemed to be going well at mid-day, with numerous artists requesting additional sales sheets because the ones they had were filled up, Sanderson said. “It’s been awesome.”
John Mayer, a math teacher at the University of Alabama at Birmingham who lives in Birmingham, walked away with numerous pieces of metal artwork.
Mayer said he comes to the show every year if he is in town the first weekend in October. This year, he picked some pieces by one of his favorite metal artists, Roberta Elliott of Cobden, Illinois. He wanted to make sure to go ahead and buy them because a shoulder injury may prevent her from continuing her artwork, he said.
Susan Wood, a Hoover resident who lives off South Shades Crest Road, said this was her first visit to the Bluff Park Art Show. The lines for the food vendors were rather long, but overall, she loved it, she said.
“It was larger than I thought it was going to be. There were a lot of vendors,” she said. Plus, the variety of art mediums was impressive, she said.
She bought some wind chimes made out of recycled wine bottles and some metal Halloween yard art.
This year’s show featured 145 artists from 10 states (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas) and Washington, D.C., said Trish Hoover, an art enthusiast from Crestline who is one of three main organizers of this year’s show.
Most of the artists have been in the show before, but this was the first time for 38 of them, Hoover said. Ninety-one are from Alabama.
A screening committee picked the artists after they submitted samples of their work in May, she said.
The show included paintings, jewelry, clay, woodworking, fiber arts, sculptures, metalworking, digital imagery, glass and mixed media, Hoover said. Each artist got a 10-foot-by-10-foot tent to showcase and sell his or her art. The Bluff Park Art Association gets 20 percent of the sales, with proceeds going to support the arts in the greater Birmingham area.
Bluff Park residents Tony and Mary Hankins said they come to the art show every year unless their favorite college team — Mississippi State University — is playing a football game at home.
“I’m not very artistic, so it’s good to see people who are,” Tony Hankins said.
It’s also a good place to come to catch up with other people in the community, Mary Hankins said.
Here is the list of awards and award winners from this year’s show:
- $3,500 Best in Show (Bluff Park Art Association Permanent Collection Purchase Award — Sidney Carter, painter, Powder Springs, Georgia.
- $1,000 August A. Moore Memorial Purchase Award — Rick Plasters, clay artist, Birmingham
- $1,750 President’s Award — Eric Johnson, sculptor, Dora
- $1,750 Award in Honor of DeeDee Morrison (2016 show judge) — Bethanne Hill, painter, Birmingham
- $1,250 Bluff Park Art Association Board of Directors Award — Charles Pinckney, jeweler, Athens, Georgia
- $500 Award of Excellence in Glass Works — Jeff and Jaky Felix, glass artist, Titus
- $500 Hugh and Jackie Dye Award — Paveen Beer Chunhaswasdikul, clay artist, Gadsden
- $500 First Commercial Bank Award — Susan Clayton, sculptor, Tallapoosa, Georgia
- $500 In Memory of Stacie Duke Harris — Yuri Ozaki, painter, Huntsville
- $500 In Memory of James Harwell — Anita Bice, painter, Moody
- $500 Hoover Arts Alliance Award — Larisa Brechun, painter, Austin, Texas
- $500 In Memory of Melinda Groover — Richie Gudzan, painter, Birmingham
- $500 Award in Honor of Jane Hinds — Debra Riffe, printmaker, Birmingham
- $500 Mills Pharmacy Award — Cathy Smart, photographer, Baton Rouge
- $500 Bluff Park Art Show Popular Vote Award — Karen Libecap, painter, Hoover