Kinston Paint Out was AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!

OOPS members, LtoR: Mitchell Morton, Stephen Greer, Kathi Lenn, Pat Boni, and Bernie Rosage, had an AWESOME time at the 1st Annual Kinston Plein Air Paint Out. The event was sponsored by The Community Council for the Arts in Kinston, NC, and organized by Mary Page Whitley. Artist, Mike Rooney, was the judge for the event. He and Mary Page even painted with the artists throughout the 2 day paint out.



We met at the gazebo in Neuseway Park on Friday at 9:00 am where Mary Page gave us the rules of engagement and a map. Rules were simple... paint within the boundaries on the map and paint as many works as possible. The areas we were to paint in had everything from a park, awesome views of the Neuse River, urban scenes, a Farmers Market, and more. On Saturday we were to turn in our best three for judging by Mike. 15 artists signed up for the paint out.



The event was part Of the Neuse River Fest and there were tons of people and activities going on. Photo above shows spectators enjoying the artwork turned in for the judging on Saturday.
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Approximately 40 works were turned in for judging... With the quality of work, Mike mentioned his task of picking three winners was TOUGH!



OOPS members fared very well in the competition... Stephen took 1st plus an Honorable Mention and Bernie placed third. (Close ups of all the OOPS members paintings in this blog post).



1st, 2nd, and 3rd... with 2 Honorable Mentions...


The winners... (LtoR)... Mike Rooney holding Stephen's Honorable Mention, Bernie (3rd), Stephen (1st), Dodie (2nd), and John (Honorable Mention).
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Every artist attending the event was a winner... the camaraderie, excellent weather, the subject matter, and nice folks of Kinston proved that! We met many talented artists and even hope to plein air paint with with a group near Greenville. Hopefully the two groups can plan their own paint outs similar to this one in the future as well.

After the judging... Mike critiqued 2 paintings per artist... to be quite honest... this 45 minutes was worth the $30 entry fee. Mike shared some great insights about subject matter and the focal point. OOPS and Onslow County are lucky to have him for a workshop next month.

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OOPS members at work...

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Kathi set up near the park where she captured most of her scenes. Hard to believe these paintings are a result of her second time working with watercolors. WOW! We still need to post her work from Saturday.

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Mitchell painted street scenes on Friday and the festival on Saturday....

Stephen painted an urban street scene and a tree on Friday. He painted his award winning Neuse River scene on Saturday...

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(Honorable Mention)

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(1st Place)

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Pat painted this quaint old gas station on Friday. She worked on a street scene also on Friday finishing it up on Saturday. We still need to publish her street scene from Saturday.

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Bernie painted a street scene and an old train station (3rd place winner) on Friday. He painted at the Farmers Market on Saturday...






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(3rd Place)

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All in all... we had a BLAST... and hope to do this again.... SOON!

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We'd love to hear your comments...