Piedmont Art Show and Sale for 74th year Oct. 28-30 at church in The Plains

This year’s 74th Piedmont Regional Art Show & Sale begins with a gala from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 28 at Grace Episcopal Church located at 6507 Main St., The Plains. Take Rt. 55 west about eight miles beyond Haymarket. Admission is $15 per person. Light snacks and drink will be served.

The show itself runs from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 29, and noon to 4 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 30. Admission is free to view the art but donations are welcome.

Grace Episcopal Church in The Plains has served as a showcase for new works by area artists for 74 years with a one-year interruption in 2020 due to COVID-19. The Piedmont Regional Art Show & Sale annually draws more than 200 works in oil, acrylic, watercolor, graphics, photography and other media. The works are exhibited in the church hall and may be purchased. Judges evaluate the entries and award prizes. Artists can enter as many as three works.

In 2021, $1,500 was the highest amount paid for an artwork at that year’s show. $60 was the lowest amount paid for an artwork. A total of 194 artworks were entered by 83 artists (up to 3 works can be entered per artist). 50 artworks were sold in 2021, generating $13,967 in total sales.

Judging the entries in this year’s show will be area professional artists Stephanie Chang, Linda Volrath and Patricia McMahon Rice.

Raised in Taiwan, Chang became infatuated with art at an early age when she learned to paint watercolors and Chinese calligraphy. Intent on furthering her skills and artistic passions, she moved to the United States where she obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Graphic Design from the Massachusetts College of Arts & Design and later a Masters in Teaching Visual Arts from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
 
Today, Chang focuses her attention on drawing and oil painting, and particularly portrait painting. She has exhibited her work both locally and internationally in numerous art shows, including the Delaware Art Museum and a solo art show at the National Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall in Taipei, Taiwan. In addition to continuing to produce new pieces, she teaches art classes for both children and adults at her in-home art studio in Rockville, Md. and the Art League School in Alexandria, VA. Most recently, she taught a summer workshop in Taipei titled “Portrait Painting in the Style of 19th Century French Salon,” and “Figure drawing in Charcoal.” She hopes to instill in her students a technical knowledge of various art mediums as well as an appreciation of art history. Chang’s website is stephaniechangart.com.

Volrath is a classically trained artist working in the traditional medium of oil in a painterly representational style. The dominant subjects of her paintings are equestrian scenes, animals, landscapes, people and still lifes. To capture the effects of light and atmosphere Volrath paints landscapes en plein air and works under natural lighting in her studio for still lifes. For equine paintings she works from her own sketches, plein air studies and reference material inspired by the world class equestrian sports of Virginia’s Blue Ridge and Piedmont area.

Volrath worked as an art director and illustrator for 15 years, during which time she studied with nationally renowned artists who were carefully selected for their oil painting techniques and styles. She has had gallery representation since 1994 and two solo exhibitions. Her work is included in many private collections across the U.S. and United Kingdom, including that of the late Sen. John Warner, many of Virginia’s prestigious horse farms and in the permanent collections of the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. and Oatlands Historic Plantation in Leesburg. Volrath is a signature member of the American Academy of Equine Art and has served as the judge for their national exhibitions.

Rice is an award-winning artist specializing in fine art paintings in the Contemporary Realist tradition. A resident of Fauquier County since 1984, Rice’s artistic approach combines a thoughtful blend of past and present using time-honored techniques and materials of the great masters while adding her contemporary flair, resulting in works of art that are aesthetically beautiful and unique. Her specialty is painting oil on copper, a surface used by Dutch and Spanish masters during the Baroque Period.

Rice is an active member of the Portrait Society of America, the International Guild of Realism and the Oil Painters of America. Her paintings have won numerous awards over the years through their annual competitions. She has also been a semifinalist for multiple paintings and drawings in the Art Renewal Center’s Annual International Salon in 2020, 2021 and 2022. Her work has been included in articles in American Art Collector magazine, Artist magazine’s Best of Drawings and the Richeson 75 International Portrait and Figure book in 2021

Rice is a founding resident of The Workhouse Arts Center in Fairfax. She moved her studio to The Plains, joining Sue Braswell and Jennifer Sims at the Stuart Street Atelier in 2021 where she teaches, paints portraits on commission and paints birds on copper.

More information about the art show may be obtained at http://www.piedmontartshow.org or www.facebook.com/artshowatgrace.