Color Las Cruces The Second Annual Plein Air Competition  And Community Arts Festival
Friday, September 9,  Saturday, September 10,  & Sunday, September 11, 2011

The Doña Ana Arts Council will present the second annual Color Las Cruces Plein Air Competition and Community Arts Festival, September 9 – 11, 2011. The event will be three full days of ongoing activities in Downtown Las Cruces, featuring  a “Quickdraw” competition,  Plein Air competition, an Artist Reception and a  Gallery showing.

Competition:

In the Plein Air competition, juried artists will compete for cash and merchandise prizes. To compete, artists will have seven hours on Friday to go to an outdoor location in Las Cruces, begin and complete a painting, and return with the finished piece.  Entry deadline is August 19, 2011.

Guest judge Preston Thayer, a noted professional and head of the NMSU Gallery, will judge the competition Saturday morning.   Winners of the Plein Air competition will be announced Saturday evening at the Artist Reception, where attendees can meet the artists, sample food, enjoy wine from local wineries, listen to live music on the street in front of the Rio Grande Theatre and see all the paintings on exhibit for the first time. A public exhibit and sale of completed paintings will take place in the  gallery on Sunday afternoon, from noon until 2:30pm, with artists in attendance.

Funds raised from “Color Las Cruces” support our Career Arts Path (CAP) program for middle school children. CAP is a two-week intensive art-based camp that explores possible careers in creative fields and allows students to experiment with different mediums.

Click here for Artist Prospectus
Click here to Enter Online

*Award winners in Plein Air competition from last year are automatically invited to the following year’s event and their fee is waived. With the artist’s permission, their winning painting may be reproduced as a limited, numbered giclee and presented to each award winner at the Arts Council’s annual community arts awards ceremony.