Sequoia Gallery + Studios has just wrapped up our first

Brenda Boylan with her finished painting of downtown Hillsboro at night, photo by Rick Paulson

annual Plein Air @ Washington County event. A total of 51 artists came together to participate in the painting competition from Oct 1 - 3 and the judging on Oct 3 at Pumpkin Ridge Ghost Creek Golf Club. During our Saturday evening Awards Reception, we gave out thirteen Awards for paintings selected by our Judge, Yer Za Vue. The paintings were a variety of landscapes painted at locations throughout the county, cityscapes painted in the evening on Main Street Hillsboro, and portraits from our Quick Draw event on the Courthouse Lawn. 

On Sunday Oct 4 the paintings were shown for sale at Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club. We brought the award-winning paintings and one selection from each of our artists to Sequioa Gallery for the month of October, opening on Oct 6. Sales of the Plein Air paintings benefited the artists as well as contributing to our Sequoia General Fund. We enjoyed new visitors to our gallery throughout the month. There has been a strong, positive response from the participating artists and the gallery membership on the success of the event.

Our decision to host the competition and show, which was previously a Hillsboro Plein Air competition hosted by the City of Hillsboro through Hillsboro Arts & Culture Council, was made by the Board to broaden our connection to the community and bring new work and new visitors to our gallery. We were able to raise funds from local businesses and individuals, art-related businesses, a project grant from HACC, registration fees from the artists, and sales of the paintings to make this a successful fundraiser for Sequoia and to ensure the continuation of this annual event for 2016. The great success of this show was possible by the hard work and talents of our Steering Committee and many volunteers. Thank you to every one involved!