13th Annual ARC Salon
ARC is pleased to present the winners and finalists of the 13th International ARC Salon Competition. This year we had over 3,750 entries from 69 countries. Our finalists represent approximately 28% of entries. ARC has acquired 11 new works for the ARC collection, valued at over $118,000. Our Best in Show went to Ming Yu, for his painting of In Bvlag, where Yu emphasizes light as a central focus. This masterful work rivals any portrait from current or prior centuries. The Bouguereau Award went to our runner up for Best in Show, Woman in the Forest, by Katsu Nakajima, which is set in the deep, vast and magical forest of Jukai, Japan.
We will now start the selection of our approximately 75 to 100 works for the live traveling version of the ARC Salon. We are extremely pleased to announce a third prominent venue for this exhibition, Sotheby's, Los Angeles, who has graciously agreed to host the ARC Salon at their prominent west coast venue. So the exhibition will now travel from the Salmagundi Club, New York City, to Sotheby's, Los Angeles, to the MEAM Museum in Barcelona, Spain. We will be holding the official award ceremony for the winners of the 13th ARC Salon on the eve of the opening at the MEAM, our final 13th ARC Salon exhibition venue. We will be announcing which works will join the exhibition throughout the planning process. The exhibition is organized giving preference to winners and honorable mentions and some finalists based on availability of works. Updates and additional information about the live exhibition of the ARC Salon can be found on the Live Exhibition page.
This year we have decided to introduce our first ever People's Choice Award. Visitors to the ARC website will be able to vote for up to 10 of their favorite finalist or winning works. The winner will receive $1,000 cash and a full page in the ARC Salon Catalogue to be published by ACC Art Books, a division of a global publisher. Visit the People's Choice Award section on the ARC Salon results pages and click on the vote button below the works of your choice to cast your votes. This option will be available for the first seven days results are live on the ARC website. The winner will be revealed on Wednesday, February 28, 2018.
The winner of The Da Vinci Initiative Award for the Young Aspiring Artist, ARC's independent side-competition for realist high-school artwork, went to 17 year old Iris Liu, for her painting Her Familiars. She has studied at Art Academy of Hillsborough, NJ, USA under the instruction of artist Kevin Murphy. We are inspired to see this work with advanced technical skills created by a 17 year old student, proving that high-school aged students are capable of learning these skill based techniques and incorporating them into unique images with a unique voice. We were thrilled that entries for this award tripled from last year. Because of so many impressive works by these young students, we have also decided to award six honorable mentions this year and plan to expand the DVI award to First, Second, and Third Place winners for the 14th International ARC Salon Competition.
In addition to these awards we have two museum awards, a Purchase Award given out by the MEAM Museum in Barcelona Spain, which went to Casey Childs for his painting of Sliver, and an exhibition award given out by the Springville Museum of Art, which also went to Casey Childs. The Springville Museum is devoting a "Featured ARC Artist" gallery wall to their museum in their Founders Gallery, to be awarded to a new artist each ARC Salon Competition. The fact that both museums independently decided to hang Childs' works in their museums, says a lot about the quality and power of his work.
We are also excited to be having our first partnership with Fashion Week San Diego, where FWSD designers will be matched with the 7 winning artists' work and the designers will create an original couture outfit and look inspired by the work of art from the ARC Salon. The ARC Salon winning works along with the specially designed garments will be on display with live models at the October 12th FWSD18 opening night and remain on exhibition paired with the couture creations. For the opening night event, FWSD and ARC will hold a panel discussion to discuss the works and partnership. In addition, that evening guests/attendees will be able to "vote" for their favorite piece and pairing. Winners will be announced the following day and additional awards will be give to the "team"/"individual" at that time. This will be an opportunity to promote Contemporary Realism to an audience who might not have seen it otherwise and to expose the Realist Art Movement to top fashion designers attending the FWSD event.
Also, four magazines, Fine Art Connoisseur, PleinAir Magazine, PoetsArtists Magazine and Collections Magazine, have given out a total of 12 awards to artists, and they will be featured in articles in each of these prominent publications. The International Arts and Culture Group (TIAC), an ARC Allied Organization®, has participated in the ARC Salon this year by awarding two $1,000 prizes to The Tissue of Time, a collaborative sculpture by Coderch and Malavia and to Nick Alm for his painting of Ruset. We will also be working with Rehs Contemporary Galleries and Arcadia Contemporary to mount an exhibition and sale at each of these influential establishments for artists chosen by these galleries in coordination with ARC, selected from ARC Salon Finalists. These shows will be held in 2018 or early 2019, exact dates to be announced. Lastly ARC Chairman Fred Ross has selected six Chairman's Choice Awards and the ARC Staff has selected an additional nine works as ARC Staff Awards.
A big thank you goes out to our 14 main Salon jurors this year, who have donated their time and efforts in selecting in addition to Best in Show, the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place awards in our nine categories as well as our special awards for Most Ambitious Work, Best Nude, Best Social Commentary, Best Trompe l'Oeil, and our Dual Category Awards. We would also like to thank an additional group of over 20 additional jurors who were involved in selecting our awards given out by partnering organizations.
Congratulations to all of our winners and finalists!
We will be accepting entries to the next, 14th International ARC Salon Competition from December 1st, 2018—March 15th, 2019.
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