Oil Pastel demo in Chicago

Just wanted eveyone to know about a demo in Chicago.
Dick Blick at 36 N. State Street in Chicago will be hosting an oil and soft pastel demonstration Saturday June 10 from 4 - 5:30.
-Lindsay

Paint-out enjoyed by all

On Saturday, May 20th, seven oil pastel artists met to paint plein air together. We met at the Riverwalk Park in downtown Naperville, a western suburb of Chicago, IL.
We had great weather and lots of fun. It was interesting to see the different set-ups each person used. We spread out over 2 blocks to paint for about 2 hours.
Here are some photos of everyone painting.































Here we all are doing an impromptu show-and-tell while we wait for our lunch table.










We had so much fun that we are going to try scheduling another paint-out next month.
If you live in the Chicago area or plan to be visiting, please join us! We will post the time and location of our next paint-out on this blog.

Paint Together on May 20th

For our next meeting we will do a Plein Air painting event on Saturday, May 20th with a rain date of Saturday, June 3rd.
On May 20th, we will be meeting at 10:00am to paint downtown Naperville and the Naperville Riverwalk. We will meet at the front doors of Barnes & Noble bookstore at Chicago Ave & Washington St. in downtown Naperville. There is street parking and a parking structure near by.
To get an idea of who will be there; if you could, leave a message here or contact me at the email below. If you just want to show up that day, that's fine too!
If you know an oil pastel artist who is not a member of the Oil Pastel Society but might like to join us, bring them along.

This is going to be so much fun!

Directions:
http://www.napervilleparks.org/parksfacilities/riverwalk/

If you have any questions, contact ann.tucker at oilpastelstudio.com
(I know, an odd way of doing my email address but I'm hoping it keeps spam robots from getting it!)

Testing subscription

Testing to see if the subscription works.

Subscribe to this blog

Okay, after talking with Carol Zack I'm trying this subscription service for our blog.
I was having problems making the RSS feed work and it required the reader to go to a special webpage to get the notice. I was not really happy with that.

What this subscription service is supposed to do is:
Once you sign up, whenever there is an update to the blog, you get an email to let you know.

You can sign up for this email notification service at the top of this page.

So let me know what you think.
Ann

Subscription Feed

I am attempting to add a subscription feed (RSS/Atom) to this blog.
The button/click may appear but that does not mean that it is working yet.
I'll let you know when I have it figured out.

Hello This is a message to let you know I have joined the blog site. This is Eve Sofferman.
I was very happy to learn of the local chapter of the oil pastel society. Please keep me
informed of what is happening with the group.

Thanks,
Eve

Hi, Carol Zack say hi (new Oil Pastel Society Member)

Just a quick note to confirm that I have signed onto the Blog as directed by Ann. Looking forward to meeting more members at our Pliein Air painting event on Saturday May 20th.

Ann, many thanks to you for your proactive leadership to get us organized.
Carol L. Zack> carol@zackartistry.com

Charter meeting

We had the Charter meeting of the Chicago Chapter this afternoon.
Carol Zack, Maureen McKee and I (Ann Tucker) met over lunch to discuss art, oil pastels and forming a chapter.

It was a great time. We each brought photos of our work. It was fun to see the different styles.
Carol, that inventory system is great. Thanks for sharing it.
Maureen, don't forget to check out that magazine
http://www.international-artist.com/
Their next contest is flowers and some of yours are beautiful.

We decided that we want to meet about once every 3-4 months. For our next meeting we will do a Plein Air painting event on Saturday, May 20th with a rain date of Saturday, June 3rd.
We’re looking forward to painting together outside.

Also, to keep in touch and share information, this blog is being opened up to all members of this chapter so that we can all post to it. As I’m still figuring out how blogs work and haven’t gotten to totally understanding how to “subscribe” or get RSS Feed, you will get an email from me whenever the blog updates. Since I get sent an email by the blog whenever it is updated, I will turn it around and let you know whenever anyone posts so you can check it out.
So to get this started, tonight I will send out the invitations to join this blog. Once you have followed the instructions in the invitation email, please leave a post saying hello and your name so we know you are part of the group.
If you would like to be a member and are not able to gain access to post, please let me know.

Working on finding a place to meet

I’m working on a place to meet now that several of us in this area have agreed that Sunday's would be the best time to meet.
A local art store is considering letting us use their classroom area. When I mentioned that few people know how to use oil pastels and that it might be helpful to have artist using OPs where their customers could see, they liked the idea.

They will let me know soon if they have a Sunday afternoon available.

I’m still looking at other places. And I’m still looking to have a meeting somewhere on either Sunday Jan 29, Feb 5 (is this bad because of the Super Bowl?) or Feb 12.
Try to keep those dates open and I’ll settle on one as quickly as possible.

First meeting will be set up in January

There are several people interested in a local chapter of the Oil Pastel Society.
With the holidays upon us, many people's schedules are full.
So in January, I will look into having a first get-together.
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Happy Holidays.
See you in January!

Oil Pastel Society - Chicago Chapter

About the Oil Pastel Society (OPS)
The Oil Pastel Society's web site opened in October, 2004. This is an international organization dedicated to oil pastels.
The aim of this new society is to offer oil pastelists an opportunity to band together, focusing on oil pastels as a serious fine art medium, and providing a viable tool through which members can interact with one another.
For more informtion on the parent organization visit:
http://www.oilpastelsociety.com/

The OPS has a number of members in the Chicago area. I am interested in creating a local chapter for members to meet once every 2-3 months to share techniques and artwork... and to meet other artists using this wonderful medium of oil pastels.

Right now this idea of a Chicago chapter is still just an idea. I am hoping it can become a reality in the very near future.

If you would like to be put on an email list to receive a notice of our first meeting, please send me your email address.

......my email address....
life2paint-@-hotmail.com
(remove the dashes around the @ symbol)
(I did this in the hope of reducing the amount of SPAM I receive.)

Or you can visit the Oil Pastel Society website and send an email to the newsletter which will also get to me.
http://www.oilpastelsociety.com/
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