All week the 6th Annual Cape Ann Plein Air Competition engine has been humming. On Saturday, the 36 juried artists descended upon Cape Ann and hit the ground running Sunday with events to kick off the weeklong competition. That afternoon, they attended a “Quick Draw” event at the Cox Reservationi in Essex before the group headed to Manchester’s Booth Cottage for a quiet opening reception welcoming them to Cape Ann.
“Plein air” painting is about getting artists out of the studio and into nature to paint what they see and how they feel, in the moment. And Cape Ann’s
natural light is famous in the art world, a perfect complement to the area’s natural beauty, rich with painting subjects from fishing, granite quarries and islands to lighthouses and miles of sandy beaches.
Manchester’s Mike Storella, a plein air painter in his own right, was a strong force in creating the event along with CAPA executive director (and Essex resident) Susan Coviello. In the six years, CAPA has grown to become the largest plein air painting competition in New England, and one of the largest in the United States, drawing visitors to the region from across the country to watch the juried artists work all week.
It’s been a great way for the area to extend the Cape Ann visitor season, and it draws artists from far and wide (from Maine to California) to capture the unique beauty here. There are also many locals who made it into the ranks of the artists—including from Rockport, Cambridge, and Ipswich.
For the artists, the $20,000 in prizes once their work is judged. But there’s also the opportunity to sell the pieces they paint all week, which supports them.
Organizers scheduled all manner of ways for the public to experience the painters as they work, right up close. They’ve scheduled “Dinner With An Artist” nights, where painters work at select restaurants (like Antique Table in Manchester, the Emerson Inn in Rockport, and Minglewood in Gloucester) giving people the opportunity to watch an artist create a painting right in front of them. Then there are two “Nocturne Painting” events. And all the while there have been near daily demonstrations that are crowd favorites highly popular, scheduled at beautiful local settings like Castle Hill in Ipswich, the Essex Shipbuilding Museum, Sharksmouth in Manchester, and Hammond Castle.
On Saturday, October 8, the weeklong event will begin wrapping up, with a gala party from 4 to 9 p.m. at the Rockport Golf Club where all the artists will be showing the 180 paintings created during the week around the Cape Ann area by all 36 plein air artists. The pieces will be for sale, and the artists who created them will be on hand to meet attendees. Then, the gala will share the judges announcement of the week’s winners, which includes the $20,000 purse to the overall winner. (Tickets are still available at capeannpleinair.org.)
Then, on Sunday, the gallery of paintings will be open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Rockport Golf Club. At noon, Cape Ann Plein Air judge Patrick Saunders will give a talk and share his process for choosing award-winning paintings, giving attendees a look at the winning paintings through his eyes.
