Monday, November 29, 2010

Back-to-Back baby! (cue the Rocky theme)

This morning I got some tremendous news to set a good tone for the week. Doug Barber, who heads up the Rivers & Spires Festival here in Clarksville called to tell me I had won their poster contest for the 2011 event. Last year was the first time the city had held this contest to get a local artist to design their festival poster. I had the honor of being the first artist chosen for the illustration I entered. Before 2010, they had been outsourcing the paintings to an out-of-state artist. The main reason they started the contest was to give local artists the opportunity to gain some exposure through this annual event. It was a real treat seeing my artwork on billboards, newspaper ads, and even tray covers at Wendy's last year! Keep an eye out for the new artwork around town toward the spring!
The 2010 Rivers & Spires Festival was a huge success drawing thousands of folks from all over the region.  This event has won a slew of awards over the past couple of years including the prestigious International Festivals & Events Association’s Gold Grand Pinnacle award and the State of Tennessee’s Tourism Spotlight Award. The festival has also been recognized as among the “Top 100 Events in North America” by the American Bus Association and “Top 20 Events in the Southeast” by the Southeast Tourism Society.  We also had the pleasure of hosting The Charlie Daniels Band as the weekend's headliner back in April.  


Here is my new work for the 2011 poster and the process of it becoming the winning design! I still have to meet with the event board over the next few weeks so this may be altered by their graphic designer. At any rate, here is the original illustration which was chosen!


I wanted to incorporate the same elements that made my drawing a winner last year but at the same time I couldn't do the same thing right?  One element I added in was the flags, which are a trademark of the festival. I also wanted make the illustration have a Downtown feel.  On the left is Franklin St and on the right City Hall to kind of frame the work out on both sides.  

As part of my prizes, I'll receive a free booth again at the Artz Galore section of the festival.  I hope to see you there for all the fun and festivities.  Stay tuned over the next few months for all the announcements as far as some big names in country music who will be headlining the main stage (If you can't stand the wait, I can give you a hint... I ran across some of the lineup already posted on Pollstar.)  The poster will also be made public with an announcement of my winning as soon as the design is finalized for print.


Just for you because today we're winners...



UPDATE Saturday, December 4th

1 comment:

  1. Love the new poster- what a tremendous achievement. Is 2011 ready for you? I hope so cause you're coming on man.

    ReplyDelete

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