Door County Plein Air Festival @ Fish Creek's Dockside Quick Paint

The artists are up early to be at Fish Creek's Clark Park to determine their last painting for the Door County Plein Air Festival 2011, which begins promptly on Saturday at 9:00 am. for the last opportunity to see the aritists in action. The Dockside Quick Paint requires that each artist complete a finished painting to be ready for the live auction by noon that day. Also participating in the Dock Side Quick Paint are the Dockside Artists, other plein air painters who will compete to win this competition for an invitation to the 2012 festival next year. Saturday's partially cloudy skies bring with them less humidity and a late July breeze off the bay. More than 40 easels dot the streets, flooded with people who eagerly watch and question the artists as they paint, causing welcome congestion.

Questioning the artists while they are actually painting and have only until 11:00 a.m. to finish a painting can be an distraction. Although even after the long, steamy week, the artists respond with a congenial answer. Numerous compliments give them energy to keep painting. A dozen or so artists paint in Fish Creek's Historic Noble Square with their portable brushes, oils, palettes, pastels and watercolors. This is where Mat Barber Kennedy begins by looking across the street to capture the Fish Creek Market's roof line. A 12 year old, Kristian Woerner, joined the quick paint as a Dockside Artist participant and works within a few feet from Kennedy to eagerly capture the historic Noble Home in the square. Even with their desperate ages, backgrounds and lives, the two artists share common purposes and a love to plein air paint.

By ten thirty Saturday morning, there's only 30 minutes to complete the last painting. The crowds continue to circulate purchasing the chips, coffee and hot dogs, sold for five dollars in Clark Park near the auction tent. Many onlookers peruse the downtown several times throughout the morning, strolling the Fish Creek streets, which allows one to see a painting in the process, from start to finish. Ullrich Glieter puts the finishing touches on a portrait of a woman by the harbor, a three quarter image representing the later years in life. This painting represents the vast freedom in the choices an artist can make. While many participants decide on the docks, boats sailing on the bay, flowerboxes and restaurants in the area, there can be the distinctive opportunity to challenge the genre with the portrait.

The 11:00 a.m. bell rings, and all the painting must stop so the artists can bring their paintings to the tent in Clark Park. Set up on the artist's portable easels, the public will have only one hour before the auction begins in the tent to bid on their favorite selection. People swarm to the tent's one side anticipating the spectacular paintings from the 40 featured artists and line the grassy border holding cameras, dogs on leashes, sunhats, soda and exclaiming their excitement when the staff places each fresh painting. Those in the crowd comment on how marvelously a painting has transformed from the 9:00 a.m. start time to being hung in the exhibition curated right before their very eyes. One woman sighs, “I love summertime with all the great umbrellas.”

Umbrellas center a focal point to numerous images in the competition. These paintings recall the spirit of the early 19^th century, and instead of Paris café tables or haystacks, the blue bay water and bright umbrellas of Door County alight on these canvases. One Door Creek painter invited to the festival, Liz Matlman, chooses carnival colors in her joyous canvases that celebrate the vibrancy to Door County life while the Fauvist inspiration can be carried to modern interpretations. Her stand out style attracts a following.

The fresh canvases will be especially fragile for the auction, all still moist and wet, although the oil can be reworked. They have already been framed, an impressive feat for the brief amount of time to mount the paintings for the auction. When one scans the work from these 40 artists, admiration is the only word worth repeating. At 12:00 noon the auction begins and the exhibition will vanish over the next two hours into collector's homes. The crowd grows weary, anxious and a little crazy, while  anticipating the impending live bidding frenzy. Art is serious business for this particular week, especially the final weekend, and the quick paint auction. 

The variety in subject material surprises: American Flags fly from porches, the Door County Market sign counterposes the Mr. Helsinki's signage to a popular wine bar on the main street, immense sailboats moor stoically in the docks, bountiful window boxes adorn the cozy cottages, and singular blooms decorate a profuse flower garden. How does one choose? Each artist again demonstrates the full capabilities to their considerable artistic gifts. What can be captured in a mere two hours of plein air painting overwhelms the imagination, the possibilities seemingly endless as the Dockside Quick Paint proves. While moving through the 40 artists imagery, all exhibited in alphabetical order, one marvels at the competition's exceptional mix to plein air painting. Near the end of the alphabet, the 2011 Best of Show winner Brian Sindler again paints an atmospheric landscape of Door County's bay. Sky and water merges in lavender and dusky blues, a minute lone sail observed from afar on the soft waves.