Upwards of 100 patrons of the arts attended the ninth annual art show at River Creek this past Friday evening along with jazz musician Keith Wilson who provided a musical background for the event.
This exhibition grew out of the vision of Kristi Nimmo, an artist herself and a poet.  One of the main features this year according to Kristi was a workshop approach to painting in which 11 artists or would be artists engaged in watercolors with scrub brushes.  Kristi says, “What distinguishes the group work is that it included the art club members who don’t consider themselves artists.”
The show also featured jewelry, textiles, pottery and photographs and it is open to any and all who have a penchant for the artistic realm. 
There were paintings in genres reaching from realism to Impressionism to Abstract Expressionism.  Suzanne Addy, one of the organizers, explained the 11 workshop paintings.  She said, “We cut paper into irregular shapes and pasted them on canvas.”  Then the artists using them as focal points applied the brush strokes.  The paintings are expressions of patterns and colors rather than objects.  And speaking of objects, Bea Snyder had an array of her stylish still lifes that seem to set the stage for the show.
And about the show’s variety Kristi says, “A lot of our canvas painters are really good at putting paint on in a way that brings out the sensuous, lusciousness of oil color.  Our watercolorists explored the luminosity of the pigment. Our photographers have explored scenes from nature. One of our club members (Susan Munoz) collects pottery and showed pieces she collected when she lived in Mexico.”
Kristi thinks that good art conveys an emotion or a feeling that speaks to someone in such a way that the person would like to revisit the piece.  “Also if it looks good on someone’s wall then that’s good art in my opinion.  I want to keep the definition as wide as possible.”