My Second Juried Showing

This past Wednesday I made the hour-and-a-half round-trip trek to West Hartford so that I could retrieve my picture of the Brooklyn Bridge from the CT+5 Art Show gallery; it was either that or have it tossed and I figured that the frame and matting were more than worth the drive!

Following that, I met up with my friend Rhonda and we made our way south so that we could check out the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts 99th Annual Juried Exhibition that is being held at the Mystic Arts Center. 

The show doesn't have its opening reception until this coming Thursday evening when they give out awards to those pieces that garnered them and at that time the place will most likely be packed with local patrons of the arts.  I wanted to see the showing but the opening reception up in West Hartford had left a rather bad taste in my mouth so I figured that if I wanted to see my picture on display along with the other entries without all of the surrounding hubbub then we needed to go at a time other than the opening.  Fortunately, the show actually opened on the 28th of May so Rhonda and I were able to pop in late Wednesday morning and have the gallery almost entirely to ourselves.

Now, I'm not sure how well you can see it in this picture (hopefully it biggifies if you click on it) but the big painting in the middle on the far wall was crowned "Best of Show". It's an oil painting of three ballerinas at rest and it carries a pricetag of something like $20,000.  Rhonda read the price, I just admired the painting!  The other big one over to the left (the blue one) was awarded Second Place and it was listed at $13,800 - or something like that.

Even though they were both nice paintings and obviously a lot of work had gone into them, they weren't my favorites in the show.  Instead I really liked the following paintings that tend to lose something as photographs because you can't see the play of light that both paintings had.   I found them both to be quite captivating and beautiful and was rather surprised that neither had garnered any sort of award at all.  Ah well, as they say "art is subjective", right?

What you can't see very well in this picture is that this painting gave one a definite sense of texture; I could have sworn that the stucco effect on the wall was something that you could tangibly feel as it looked so "there" but nope, it was strictly an effect of the paint itself.  I thought this was one of the most beautifully done still lifes that I have ever seen.

The picture above was actually my very favorite as it was almost like standing outside and watching the sun set and lighting the sky a golden hue, again the picture just doesn't do the painting justice.  Truth be told, I'm a sucker for well-done landscapes and I thought this was one was very well done.

As for my photographic entry into the show, it was located in a rather nice corner of the gallery near a lovely french door that gave one a beautiful view of the Mystic River outside.  Mine is on the top on the left; it was hard to get a picture of it without reflections on the glass so this is the best I could get ...

Oh, and I appear to have changed my name in spite of having corrected it on the entry form before dropping off my picture prior to the show's opening. I guess I've somehow managed to become Swedish!  I really do need to work on my penmanship if that's what my name looks like these days!

Following our tour of the gallery, Rhonda and I took ourselves off to The Olive Garden and had a lovely luncheon of unlimited soup, salad, and breadsticks followed by dessert that we probably should have skipped but decided to have anyway!  Hey, sometimes you just gotta have dessert and what better time than after having viewed some nice artwork?  After all, dessert is cultured, right??

An Award for Amanda

I was going to do a post today using some of my photos from Vermont as I've finally got a good number of them edited but something more important than covered bridges came up when Amanda informed me that the self-portrait that her art teacher had put in an art show won first place.  The awards ceremony was held yesterday afternoon down at the Mystic Arts Center and what kind of mother would I be had I not taken pictures to record the auspicious occasion and then shared them here on the blog?

We almost didn't go to the auspicious occasion, though, as Amanda has a fear of crowds and was a nervous wreck at the thought of having to walk in front of a group of people to receive an award.  I spent a good deal of the morning dealing with teenage wailing, door slamming, and the gnashing of teeth but finally my friend Paula, who is an art teacher down at Grasso Tech in Groton, told Amanda to quit giving me a hard time about it and go get her darned award.  She even agreed to meet us down there for the ceremony and we could do lunch afterward.

After convincing Amanda that it was simply going to be a bunch of other art students, their parents, and art teachers and all she would have to do was walk up, shake hands, get her award, and smile for a picture she finally agreed to go.  It helped that her friend Sami was here to lend moral support and knowing that Paula would be there, too, was probably the deciding factor.

The Opening Reception for the Young at Art show was scheduled from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. with the awards ceremony at 2:00 so we arrived around 1:15 or so as parking in Mystic is always dicey at best and with hordes of proud parents flocking to see their offspring's artwork, it was going to be even more of a mess.  Luckily we found a spot near the art center and went in to check out the exhibition along with what looked to be several hundred other people.  Ut-oh ... was Amanda going to get all nervous again??

At first I think she felt a bit awkward seeing her self-portrait displayed prominently in the middle of the wall surrounded by all sorts of other pieces but once Sami told her how great it was, Amanda seemed to settle down some as we walked around and looked at the other areas of the exhibit.  Naturally I had to take a picture with the picture as that's what you do at these sorts of things!

As the awards ceremony began, Amanda was beginning to fear that Paula wasn't going to be able to make it in time as she was having a horrible time trying to find a parking space.  With entries from 49 different schools, the place was obviously packed!  Luckily, though, they started the awards with the younger kids first and as they received their awards, the place began to thin out and Paula was able to grab a parking spot and make it inside just moments before Amanda's name was called and she went up to her get her certificate.

In addition to the very nice certificate, Amanda was given $100 to use towards one course at the 2010 Summer Art Camp at the Mystic Arts Center. Whether she'll be able to actually use it or not remains to be seen as there's only one course geared towards her age group that runs from August 9th to 13th and costs $170 to attend.  Even though I'm fairly certain I could come up with the other $70 by then, the big problem would be getting her back and forth for the course as it runs from 1:00 to 4:00 in the afternoon and Mystic is a bit of a distance from here.  We'll see, it may still be do-able and if not, that's okay as Amanda still has bragging rights for having won 1st Prize in the 2D art category plus her good friend was there to share the moment with her - it doesn't get much better than that!

Wanting to give credit where credit is due, I took pictures of the 2nd and 3rd prize entries also.  2nd Prize went to Maddie Pryor for a self-portrait photographic entry (Maddie is home-schooled) -

3rd prize went to Meaghan Doyle, another Norwich Free Academy student that Amanda knows from one of her classes, and her oil painting titled "Cupcake at Sunset" -

The award for 1st Prize in 3D artwork also went to a Norwich Free Academy student, Joseph Gennaro, for his entry titled "In the Vortex" which is done in pewter and wood -

In between Amanda being congratulated, we spent some time looking at the entries from Paula's students as well as some of the other pieces we hadn't been able to see earlier due to the crowds then decided that it was time to get something to eat.  We walked across the street to Margaritaville and had passable Mexican food (by Connecticut standards).  To be honest, the chicken enchilada I had was actually very good though it may have been flavor enhanced by the frozen margarita I used to wash it down!

Following our late lunch we walked around a little bit in downtown Mystic and enjoyed a bit of the beautiful day along the Mystic River -

 

All in all, it was a very nice day made even better by lunch with an old friend and Amanda finding out that she really can walk up, get an award, and not throw up on her shoes as she she feared she would do!  I'm so proud!

I Can Haz Cheeseburger - and Fries!

The topic of really good cheeseburgers came up at work last Thursday afternoon and after I had mentioned that I really enjoyed the Old Timer Burger at Chili's, my dispatch partner Jeff said that as far as he was concerned Five Guys made THE best ever cheeseburgers; that opinion was quickly seconded by our scheduler, Chica.

Now the only thing I knew about Five Guys was that Amanda had raved about the place when she used to go down to New Jersey to visit her friend Darci but I'd never actually been to one myself. As a matter of fact, I was under the mistaken impression that the closest one to us was way up in Enfield - which is north of Hartford - as I'd seen the sign the couple of times we'd driven up to see Sami. Jeff immediately set me straight on that one and said that there was one down in Mystic in the same plaza as Starbucks - a relatively easy drive and definitely within striking distance of Norwich.

With the sun shining this past Saturday (something it is most definitely NOT doing today), Amanda and I set out for Mystic in search of Five Guys and their legendary cheeseburgers around 2:00 p.m.  The small shop was very easy to find as I knew where the Starbucks was but it is most definitely unassuming; chances are if you didn't know it was there, you'd never even think to look there as it just blends in with the rest of the shops.

Even though it was after lunchtime, there was still a pretty good crowd inside the restaurant that reminded me a bit of California's famous In n' Out Burger with its red and white-checked color scheme though the peanut shells all over the floor weren't something one would ever see at an In n' Out!  

Apparently one of the attractions of Five Guys is the big boxes of peanuts they put out for their customers to help themselves to while waiting for their order to be ready and the floor is the accepted place for the shells.  Okay ... I was just going to have to remember to walk carefully as I could just see myself slipping on peanut shells and landing on my butt in the middle of the dining area!

The menu is pretty simplistic which in my opinion is the hallmark of a good burger joint and Amanda wasted no time in ordering a bacon cheeseburger with lettuce and pickles while I ordered a basic cheeseburger with lettuce, tomato, pickles, and mayo; two small fries and one root beer completed our order.  Before we barely had a chance to crack open a few peanuts (stupid me didn't want to throw the shells on the floor so put them in a neat pile on the table!) our number was called and I brought a brown paper sack back to our table that felt awfully darned heavy for just two burgers and two orders of fries. I soon found out why and wish I had know this before ...

The fries at Five Guys are apparently rather famous not just for their flavor but for their quantity.  Sure, they put some of your fries in a small cup but your order of fries doesn't stop there - they overflow the cup and take up a good portion of the paper sack, too!  Our two small orders of fries could have fed a family of six with fries left over for another meal!  Were there such a place as French Fry Heaven, surely we had entered it!

I had to laugh today as I sat down to write this post as one of the news articles that popped up on Yahoo! actually mentioned that Five Guys french fries had once again made the Men's Health list of America's Worst French Fries.  According to the article, Five Guys fries rate as the "Worst Regular Order of Fries" with the following stats:

Five Guys Fries (large)
1,464 calories
71 g fat (14 g saturated)
213 mg sodium

"Unfortunately, Five Guys doesn’t offer anything but fries in the side department. Your safest bet, of course, is to skip the fries altogether (you’d be better off adding a second patty to your burger), but if you can’t bring yourself to eat a burger sans fries, then split a regular order. That will still add 310 calories to your meal, but it beats surrendering more than 75% of your day’s calories to a greasy paper bag."

Well, heck - it would have been nice to know that before Saturday! Even without benefit of this article, though, I made a mental note to only ask for one regular order the next time we were there as Amanda and I brought home what seemed like half a bag of fries which she later ate for dinner.  Oh, and according to the sign displayed in the restaurant, our fries that day came from Shelley, Idaho potatoes.  It's always good to know whose potatoes you're eating!

But enough about the fries and how bad they are for you (though they taste really, really good!) - what about that cheeseburger?  Ah yes, that cheeseburger!   I really was not expecting a double-patty monstrosity that barely fit on the bun but that is exactly what greeted me when I unwrapped the foil it came in and let me tell you ... it was GOOD!  Granted, I had to put it down and make ample use of several napkins between just about every bite but when it comes to cheeseburgers, that's not a bad thing!

I'd have to say that my Five Guys cheeseburger was very possibly the very best cheeseburger that I have had in a long time - bar none!  It was juicy, it was flavorful, it was sliding off the bun ...   It was well worth the drive down to Mystic!  Granted, I wouldn't want to make a regular habit of Five Guys burgers as I've got a pretty good idea that they aren't good for one's arteries at all but if you're going to treat yourself then this is a good way to do it.  Just remember to ask for one regular order of fries to split with your entire family!

So, who's hungry??

Sunday Scenery

I shot this picture while Amanda and I were down in the Mystic, Connecticut area yesterday in search of what I had been told was "the best cheeseburger ever". We found it and it was!  Details will be forthcoming on that later but for now, everyone have a great Sunday and do something nice for yourself - you deserve it!