The event is a production of the Association, made up of over 4,000 artists according to its president, Ken Cadwallader.
“For many of us, as artists, we come here and we look at the artwork and we discover what we want to go home and paint,” Cadwallader told 89.9 FM WJCT public radio Associate Producer, Shannon LeDuke in an interview that aired today. “It’s very inspiring. It gets your juices flowing.”
Cadwallader says events like this raise awareness for traditional oil painting.
Hundreds of art collectors, buyers and tourists mingled at the event; including St Augustine Mayor, Nancy Shaver, who told Historic City News that she wouldn’t have missed it.
“If I have an addiction, its art,” the mayor told reporters. “I’ve had it since I was a small child and my mother took me to the National Gallery in Washington, D.C.”
St Augustine was chosen for a lot of reasons, including its beautiful location, its history, and Cutter & Cutter, which is a very prestigious gallery.
“It’s not easy being an artist, especially since 2008,” gallery owner Len Cutter said. “The Association has 4,000 members; 2,000 of which were invited to submit, to see if they’d get into the show, and then two hundred artists made the cut.”
South Korean artist Jin Hee Lee is in America on an artist’s visa made possible, in part, by a recommendation letter from the Association. Lee attended the reception with her entry, “By Window” which has a price of $2,000 next to her name, and a red sticker above that which reads, “Sold”.
The Oil Painters of America exhibition runs through May 25th.
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