73rd Butler National Mid-Year Show

After a year of rejections for shows, prizes and a humiliating attempt to get on American Idol, I have finally been accepted to hang some work in a show- and as you can see from the title of this post, it is an national show at a museum. So that is some good stuff.
This was a good shot in the arm for me and prevented me from throwing a noose over the rafter of the studio at least for a while.

Here is the painting that got into the show.

Chocolate Milk and Candy (the son), 22 x 14, oil on linen
This is part of diptych, the other half of which is hanging in the Rottinghaus gallery. Both works are for sale.

Another cool thing was that my good friend Carl Samson also got a painting in the show. We both drove our work up to the Butler Institute on Friday. This little museum is in Youngstown Ohio, and is an architectural masterpiece built by McKim, Mead and White. A long drive from Cincinnati, but we had a great time at the museum which has a pretty good collection of work for such a small institution. There are some heavy hitters there, the most famous being Winslow Homer's Snap the Whip. There was Paxton painting that was the highlight of the collection for both of us. It had brilliant drawing, coloring and amazing form. A real beauty. The only thing wrong with it was that it was hung between two miserable Thomas Eakins, but it was easy to ignore them (I should do a post sometime about why Eakins is the most overrated artist in American painting). Other great paintings includ a nice Birge Harrison, a lovely Emil Carlson seascape and two very nice Whistlers.

Enough about those other hacks- my painting will be on view at the Butler from June 28 through August 23. There is going to be a meet the artist reception and awards ceremony on Sunday, June 28 from 1 to 3. The event is free, but they ask for reservations.