Although we serve the general community of Sausalito visitors and residents, we have been blessed with the support of many wonderful artists in a town that for generations has been referred to as an Artist’s Community. (See below).
In that spirit, we wanted to get the word out that the deadline for getting your application in for the 2012 Sausalito Art Festival is this Thursday, March 1 at 5:00 PM.
For a late fee of an extra $100 you can submit until March 14.
* If the image on this link sets you aback, the two figures on the left are statues, not people. But I admit I did a double-take when I walked by them!
Not an artist but curious how it all works?
Artists must submit both samples of their work and a design for their display booth to an independent jury process that looks at that work with no names attached. The artists on the juries then select whom to invite to exhibit at the Festival.
There’s another requirement, too: it costs from $1,200 to $2,900 for a booth at the Festival, depending upon size and placement. Many artists whose work merits inclusion do not apply because they won’t sell enough art to justify the expense, especially since they may have their own galleries where they successfully sell their work.
For this reason many of the exhibitors are road warriors who specialize in this kind of festival, and Sausalito is the biggest outdoor event of its kind in North America. Each Labor Day Weekend we see many fancy RV’s, oversized trailers and homes on wheels pull into the parking lots near the headquarters of OurSausalito.com… which just happens to be near the Festival. Some of these artists report being in Oregon the week before and that they’re bound for Santa Barbara, Coronado or Phoenix the week after.
We’ll keep you posted on all the Labor Day events for the Sausalito Art Festival and for local artists’ open studios around town.
What are some of the roots of our culture as an art scene in Sausalito? Greek-French Artist Jean Varda, who was part of the Paris salons of the 1920’s with Picasso, Hemingway, Stein et al, partnered with English artist Gordon Onslow Ford to buy the ferryboat S.S. Vallejo and moor it in Sausalito in 1948, beginning a major expansion of the artist presence on our waterfront.
Seven Degrees of Separation Dept.: During this time Varda taught at the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute), where one of our Editors’ grandmothers was one of his students. (Let’s just say that it’s lucky said Editor writes well, because he does not appear to have inherited his grandmother’s skills as a professional Artist!)
Philosopher Alan Watts replaced Ford as Varda’s partner in 1961, and ushered in another area of growth in the Sausalito creative community.
Interested in Sausalito history? Check out the Sausalito Historical Society!
