I hope everyone’s 2019 is off to a good start and you are getting many opportunities to paint. I usually find the winter months to be more productive for me, but this year has been an exception so far. Motivation seems to be taking a long winter’s nap that is proving difficult to shake off. I can’t even blame it on the weather really, as so far, we have had a very mild winter here in Calgary.

Even though I haven’t been painting much, I have been very busy. In October and November, we were busy with our 6th annual online members show. Every year this show is attracting more and more members and submissions. Our juror, Karin Richter, had a daunting task of selecting the paintings from approximately 140 entries. We increased the number of awards this year by adding 2 more Honorable Mentions. We have 10 new signature members from this show, 2 MPACs and 8 new PACs.

We are also in the early stages of putting together our 28th annual Purely Pastel exhibition. The show will be held once again at Federation Galllery on Granville Island in Vancouver BC. The call for entry will be sent to members in early February and the highlights of the call are included in this newsletter. We are really encouraging members from across the country to enter this show as again, we are increasing the number of awards. It’s also a great way of getting your work seen in a professional gallery in a different part of the country.

The IAPS convention is also quickly approaching. June is coming up fast and hopefully many PAC members will be attending the convention. I’ll be there attending the Presidents’ forum. Christine Camilleri is receiving her Master Circle medallion, and Andrew McDermott is an instructor as well as the awards juror for the 34th IAPS exhibition being held during the convention. It should be a great time, especially treating ones self in the candy store!

Another big initiative we are undertaking is overhauling our website. Our current website has served its purpose well over the past decade but it is time to get up to current internet standards. I have spent a fair bit of time over the past couple of months putting together a proof of concept that the board will be reviewing. We will be creating the website in WordPress that will allow us to update the site more often and give it a contemporary feel. We are planning to have the new site up in the mid April timeframe. We will keep members informed of its progress through our PAC Updates.

I’d also like to introduce our two new workshop volunteers. While the West workshop position was open for a while, Andrea Pyman, Susan Typert and Jo-Anne Finegan who hosted a very successful workshop with Stan Sperlak, stepped down from the East workshop team. Now Lynda Lynn will take over from them and Lyn Thomas will fill the West workshop role. We do have one other vacant position and that is the East promotion spot. Kim Martin did a great job getting donations from sponsors for our 2018 ICAN and Purely Pastel show but she has had a great opportunity come her way and as a result won’t have time in her schedule to continue. So, we are looking for someone to fill her spot for 2020.

So, with all this happening, how does one get their motivation back to actually paint? Well I’m hoping to find some inspiration and pointers from all of you how have contributed to our current newsletter’s theme of “Choosing Your Subject Matter”. Maybe it’s time to go back to landscape or figurative work for a while? What do you think?

PAC President – Kathy Hildebrandt