I am always honored when I learn one of my paintings has been juried into a national show.  Learning that "Merry Martini" was juried into the National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society's Best of America Juried Exhibition was no exception.  This year's show will be held at Cutter and Cutter Fine Art Gallery in St. Augustine, FL from Nov. 6th through Nov. 29th.  This show will be hung in the gallery although the final decision has not been made as to whether the activities around the show will be onsite or virtual in the continuing pandemic.  My painting will visit St. Augustine even if I am unable to do so and St. Augustine is a city I was looking forward to visiting.  The pandemic strikes again!  Still I am very happy to be a part of the show.  

I cannot begin to express how excited I was to learn that "Playing With Black and White" (20x16 oil on panel) won the President's Award of Excellence  at the 2020 Oil Painters of American's Annual Juried Exhibition.  Like so many shows this year the show itself was hung at the RS Hanna Gallery in Fredericksburg, TX but all the events around the show were held virtually.  This included the Awards Ceremony which was held via Zoom on Thursday, September 10th.  I had already registered to watch the ceremony when I received an email from OPA Thursday morning telling me I would be receiving an award.  I was so amazed to receive the email.  I have been very lucky about getting into the OPA shows.  This has been a point of pride as with over 3500 members there are always well over 2000 entries.  Out of the 2000 plus entries only 150 to 175 paintings get juried into the show depending on the size of the host gallery.  But I have never been lucky enough to win one of the awards at an OPA show.  When I got the email I was thinking maybe an honorable mention award.  But as I was watching the awards presentation the awards for still life went to other artists.   I began wondering what my award was.  Imagine my astonishment to learn it was the President's Awards of Excellence.  The judge, Rose Franzen. shared that my painting was in the running for an award from the beginning....she just wasn't sure which one.  She spoke to technical expertise, composition and the fact that it was just fun.  Talk about being on cloud 9!  And this award comes with a check for $1000.  Yes....definitely a happy camper.