2013 SCBWI Southern Breeze Gallery Show!

Friday night was opening night for our 2013 Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators Southern Breeze (Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi) Gallery Show hosted at the Decatur Library by the Georgia Center for the Book during the Decatur Arts Festival opening ArtWalk. We had ten artists showing their work in this year's show: Prescott Hill; Jill Dubin; Yours truly, Elizabeth Dulemba; Laura Freeman; Mark Braught; Laura Knorr (Braught); Bill Mayer; Susan Nees; and Sarah Frances Hardy.
     Many of the artists and their spouses were in attendance for opening night. (Click to see larger.) From the left is: Scott Nees; Susan Nees; Lisa Michaels - wife to Prescott Hill; Laura Freeman; me; Joe Davich of the Georgia Center for the Book; Bill Mayer; Amy Schimler; Lee Mayer, Mark Braught; and my hubbie Stan.

Each art piece was accompanied by its corresponding book title and it came together beautifully...




     Our opening night was a blast, catered by Badda Bing. We did a sketch challenge - each illustrator draws a few lines adding to an illustration that ends up being... well, that's anybody's guess!

When we finished with the challenge, two young attendees decided to do their own challenge... so cute.


I tried to do a better job with photos this year—so here are the illustrators with their work...
Amy Schimler...

Bill Mayer (who apparently always takes photos like this...)
Laura Freeman...

Mark Braught... (Unfortunately, his wife Laura couldn't make it to pose with her pieces...)

Prescott with his wife, Lisa...

Susan, celebrating her first time in the show...

And me, who apparently can't stay still long enough for her picture to be taken...

Not that I was the only goof that night...

     Afterwards we went to Colbeh Persian restaurant for a fun-filled fall apart. What a great time! Peeps, good art, good food, and general mayhem - what could be better?
     The intent of the show is to impart the idea that book art is art and that the children's books you enjoy are indeed works of art—performance art, which is not fully realized until being enjoyed by a reader.
     And while opening night is a blast - the real treasure is after we leave and the show is enjoyed by thousands of library patrons as they wander through. Stan and I went back the next day and were privy to some of the wonderful comments and interest in just the short time we were there.
     We're so grateful to the Decatur Library and the Georgia Center for the Book—the library is the perfect place to host our show!