Festival ’90

Limited Edition Print with Watercolor Remarques
Edition of 150 S/N
Image: 22″ x 32″
$200

Back in 1980 I was commissioned to do the book cover painting and “Print of the Year” for the Tenth Anniversary of the prestigious Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland. I was pleased and honored and I painted a piece called “Festival ’80.” It was a large sporting still life centered on the Festival and the Eastern Shore. It was successful beyond my wildest expectations. The print all but sold out during the three days of the show in November of 1980, and it is nearly impossible to find one for sale today. The original hangs in the Waterfowl Festival Headquarters.

In 1990 I was again commissioned by the Festival to do a piece for the Twentieth Anniversary, again to be used on the Festival book cover and to be the “Print of the Year.” It was called “Festival ’90.” While “Festival ‘80” was more “hunterly,” containing shotgun shells, gunpowder tins and other hunting artifacts, “Festival ‘90” centers more around the show itself and requires a bit of explanation even for those familiar with the show.

The color, detail and the “trompe l’oeil” (fool the eye) format is typical of my sporting still life paintings. The books, for the most part, relate to either the show or the area. While most of the books are real, three were made up just for fun. The Festival logo appears in a couple of places, both carved into the door and the “service award” trophy given by the Festival. The canvasback decoy is a tribute to the artifacts which play an important role in the show. The shorebird and unfinished decoy head, along with the knife and wood chips are a tribute to the marvelous carvers in the show. The goose call is perhaps the most famous and sought after call on the Eastern Shore, aptly called “The Eastern Shoreman.” The yellow book in the center is the first Festival book, and is a collectors’ item. To the left of the book is my invitation; to the right is a Festival brochure.

Finally, the busy looking scraps of paper need some explanation. Since I was the only artist in twenty years to be commissioned to do two cover paintings, I felt that it would be fun to involve other cover artists as well as the “old guard” who have been in the show since the beginning, or at least since the early years. With that in mind I sent out scraps of paper to those artists, many of whom are friends. I asked them to write something apropos to the Twentieth Anniversary of the show or to do a related remarque. Whatever each artist sent back to me (with his or her permission), I reproduced. Some are serious; some are humorous. But each one added something special. The painting took nearly three months to complete, but I think it was worth it.

There are only a handful of the 150 prints allotted to me available; all have watercolor remarques.