Fair Chair Sign-off
What a year it has been! A year of many firsts—first-ever hybrid event, first ever Juried Competition Show & Sale, first-ever virtual art market!
It has been both challenging and rewarding to serve as Fair Chair for 3 years and Marketing Chair for 4.
We increased and exceeded our fundraising goal in each of the last 3 years. In 2018, we raised roughly $45,000 and in 2021 we received pledges for $85,715 and, to date, have collected $79,215.
The Official Fair Guide has come a long way starting with our partnership in 2018 with America Meredith, publisher of First American Art Magazine. In 2019 and 2020, we partnered with Josh Rose, publisher of Native American Art Magazine (NAAM) and his fantastic team, and in 2021 with Adolfo Castillo and Wendie Martin, the new publishers. Most of the Feb/Mar issue of Native is devoted to the fair and the museum. Although the entire month of December is consumed by the magazine, it is a great feeling to see it in print. I am proud to have served as a guest editor on the 2019, 2020 and 2021 issues.
Thank you to Allison Lester who wears too many hats to count! She crafted the messaging and created all Fair communications to museum members, worked with Dan Hagerty and Jack Schwimmer to create benefits for ribbon and corporate sponsors, included the Fair in her member newsletter and Earthsong as well as managing online ticketing and admissions at the live event. She is a multi-talented, consummate professional and the Heard is lucky to have her!
As many of you know, Pat Kilburn was Fair Chair for 3 years, ran Juried Competition for 4 years and managed judging this year. Pat has been my Fair Chair mentor. She has always been a reliable sounding board as well as a source of information and inspiration. I am grateful for her support and friendship.
To each and every one of the Fair volunteers who contributed time and talent to the Fair during my tenure as Chair, thank you! You saw me through an initial steep learning curve and carried on beyond your 2-year commitment, many of you years beyond, for the benefit of the artists.
All the best to the next Fair team.
Anna Flynn
2021 Fair Recap
Best of Show VII Diverse Art Forms Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty (Assiniboine/Sioux)
Pandemic Survivalist
The 63rd Annual Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market, and our first-ever HYBRID Fair (Virtual and Live Events), kicked off on Thursday, March 4 with the premiere of the Best of Show Awards video. If you missed it, or want to watch again, CLICK HERE.
The Fair officially opened at 9 a.m. on Friday, March 5 when the virtual Artists’ Galleries went live (CLICK HERE) and Steele’s doors opened to buyers at our first-ever onsite Juried Competition (JC) Show & Sale.
Our first-ever virtual Juried Competition Show & Sale opened at 10 a.m. The Show & Sale closed at 4 p.m. on Sunday. The week of March 8, volunteers facilitated the pick-up and shipment of art and award checks. Last week, the sales proceeds were sent to artists. As usual, a small, core group of dedicated volunteers and staff worked pre-Fair to make this event happen and continue to work post-Fair to wrap it up.
By the Numbers
The Virtual Fair:
305 Artists in the Virtual Artists’ Galleries
Juried Competition:
123 Participating Artists
251 Submissions
104 Cash Awards
12 Non-cash Honorable Mentions
Fundraising
$85,715 Pledged
$79,215 Received as of 3.19.2021
$67,600 Awarded
Juried Competition Show & Sale:
$302,075 Juried Competition art sales ($265,805 onsite and $36,270 online)
$67,825 JC sales made directly by 9 artists as reported by artists.
Number of people at the ONSITE Juried Competition Show & Sale
Total 806 (Friday 284, Saturday 311, Sunday 211)
Exhibitors Committee
Many thanks to Cathy Robertson for once again taking on this demanding role in a year filled with change and uncertainty. Cathy implemented the ZAPPlication online registration platform, dealt with artists questions and managed paper applications for artists who could not access the online platform, managed all artists inquiries about anything and everything, managed jurying-in process, processed receipt of documents and payments, and managed all communications with the artists. Cathy fielded ALL the calls on the artists’ designated cell phone number—and they come in morning, noon and night, 7 days a week. When artists tell you that the Guild is known for its hospitality, remember that the ExComm Chair is essentially the almost-year-round hospitality manager. Cathy also opened an Instagram account for the Fair and to date has 1,088 followers. CLICK HERE to check it out.
Native American Art Magazine
The Guide to Market section of the Official Fair Guide is the most important section to the artists. In it, we identify Standard-Bearers, Who to Know Now and Who to Watch as well as spotlight 3 or 4 artists in each classification. Thank you to Laura Cardinal in the Shop for her thoughtful input and assistance and for coordinating with Bruce McGee and James Barajas for their input. Diana Pardue, Ann Marshall and Janet Cantley in curatorial always gave thoughtful consideration to this section as well as contributing feature articles. Gathering artists’ statements, headshots and art images from 40-50 artists is a time-consuming task. Special thanks to Stephany Madsen, Pat Kilburn, Shelley Mowry, Anita Hicks and Cozette Matthews for helping this year.
Native American Art magazine is launching a podcast in April. We were delighted that Native conducted their first 12 interviews onsite. These included David Roche and 11 fair artists.
Virtual Fair and the New Fair Website
Jewel Clark developed the technical specification, worked with me on the aesthetic spec and hired, on behalf of the Guild, a third party to design and build the website. Jewel was my go-to on technical issues. She optimized and uploaded video, taught me to edit and resize images for the web and caught most of my mistakes. I created and added page content and added artists’ bios and links. After I added all the artists images to the media library, Diane Leonte uploaded them to each artist’s page. I provided IT support to artists during the weekend while Jewel fielded all non-artists queries. Jewel is truly a jewel and an invaluable member of the Fair team. CLICK HERE to visit the Fair website.
Juried Competition
How do you pull off a live juried competition during a pandemic? It takes a village. A masked village. We could not have done this without the Shop. Thank you to Bruce McGee, Kelly Gould and James Barajas for receiving and unpacking art and Megan Richmond for photographing each entry. These images and their 4-digit item number were critical to our ability to run the JC Show & Sale. While Shop staff said it was fun talking to artists and seeing the art, I would not be surprised if more than a few second thoughts crossed their minds over the past 6 weeks! The next time you are on campus, stop by and thank the Shop staff.
Art was received (shipped or hand-delivered) between Feb. 1 – 21. Human nature being what it is, we expected to receive most items closer to the deadline. And boy did we! We received a total of 258 items, and more than half arrived the last weekend. The massive winter storm caused shipping delays for some artists. We received 6 baskets and 1 Personal Attire entry AFTER judging, but in time for the sale. Only one item was damaged in transit and it appeared to be caused by improper packaging.
Juried Competition: Judging
Lynn Endorf spent many days in the Shop and clocked many miles moving the art from the Shop to Encanto where he organized the art by class and division. Diana Pardue, Ann Marshall and the Mellon Fellows moved the art into Steele, set up for judging, assisted throughout the judging process and reorganized art for the Show & Sale.
Pat Kilburn and Lee Peterson decided to use one slate of 5 judges to judge all classifications and a small group of assistants to manage the process. This group worked extremely well together. It is a testament to the quality of art submitted by the artists and the professionalism of the judges that they awarded most of the ribbons despite a much smaller pool of submissions.
Thank you to Rita Baker and Robby Buchanan for handling the behind-the-scenes aspects of the process. Rita entered winners in the database, prepared the check requests for award checks and provided the winners list. Robby coordinated with Lee Peterson to ensure that the correct ribbon was matched with the winning art and recorded properly.
Fundraising
The bulk of Fair fundraising is for ribbon sponsors for the juried competition awards program. We are especially grateful to the Berlins, Petersons and the Head Family whose continued generosity funds our $15,000 Best of Show Award. IlgaAnn Bunjer worked tirelessly on Ribbon Fundraising for 5 or 6 years and Beth Koch-Huston stepped up in 2021. Dan Hagerty, Jack Schwimmer, Christina Harris and former Heard staffers, Rebecca Simpson and Tisha Clyde, were always there to support and assist us in our fundraising efforts these last few years.
Best of Show Awards and Video
CLICK HERE to watch the first-ever Best of Show Awards Video which premiered on Thursday, March 4. Navajo painter and videographer Steven Yazzie and his associate Gabe Fermin produced the video. Gabe interviewed the judges and Diana Pardue at JC judging and shot a ton of video. The 12 artists recorded themselves on their smartphones. For some, this was their first experience with selfie-videos. They all did a fantastic job! Background music was compliments of Robert Doyle, Canyon Records. CLICK HERE for a list of all award-winners.
The Best of Show Award was given to Assiniboine and Sioux beadwork and quillwork artist Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty for her soft sculpture doll titled Wakitantanka (Strong-Willed) Pandemic Survivalist. It depicts a Sioux woman dressed in a penny dress standing on a beaded COVID image and surrounded by the words Smallpox 1630, Spanish Flu 1918, Covid 2019 and Wakitantanka which means strong-willed. The piece was acquired for the museum’s permanent collection. CLICK HERE to read the VOGUE magazine article, “The Pandemic-Themed Artwork Honoring the Resilience of Indigenous People.”
Juried Competition Show & Sale—LIVE at the Heard
John Nesbitt took on two huge tasks this year—the production and sale of the Fair t-shirt and the JC Show & Sale. The t-shirt was sold exclusively online through Bonfire. Bonfire took the orders, processed payment, batch printed and shipped shirts. We had no money tied up in inventory. Because we are a non-profit, the processing fee was only 3.5%.
John made the mistake of telling me his crack sales team would not have anything to do since they were not selling t-shirts onsite. He put his considerable skill and experience into running the Show & Sale, quickly sending me 25 questions to help him plan and organize the onsite sale.
John Nesbitt and Joel Muzzy came up with a system whereby the 4-digit code assigned to each item was used to coordinate the simultaneous online and onsite sale as well as pick-up by the buyer, the artist or UPS after the sale closed. Joel cropped and edited the intake images and created a photo book with each image and its assigned item number. This was a brilliant idea! These booklets were used onsite by the floor sales volunteers to ensure that the right item was rung up and sold for the correct price and to facilitate art pick-up and returns to artists.
Joel Muzzy also coordinated staging with Pat Kilburn for the judging, with John Nesbitt for the sale, with events coordinator Julie Sullivan and with AJ Gulley, head of security. Joel definitely clocked some miles even with a smaller event! Thank you to AJ and his Security team for ensuring the safety of the art and for the countless trips to unlock and lock Steele and Encanto.
Terry Nesbitt and Richard Borgmann were the cashiers at the Show & Sale Friday – Sunday. Terry then returned to coordinate the pick-up and shipping process with John. Tom Myers, one of John’s regular merchandise salesforce volunteers, spent 6 days in Steele wrapping items for buyers and artists and to transport to UPS. He was a quiet force and constant presence available to help anyone who needed it.
Juried Competition Show & Sale—VIRTUAL
After I determined that we could run an online Show & Sale through the Instant Buy function in the GiveSmart platform, I needed someone to create and post the items. A huge thank you to Jan McAdams who crafted a brief description of each item from the often-lengthy information on the entry forms and posted online. Because Joel had already processed Megan’s images, I was able to drop them in and we were ready for online sales.
Lynn Endorf monitored the online sales and coordinated with the floor salesforce to avoid double-selling an item. We only had one instance of double-selling and that occurred when an artist sold a painting and did not inform us for several hours. The only other glitch was that some people accidentally clicked “Buy.” Once we realized this, we were able to manage the simultaneous onsite and online sale fairly smoothly.
Art Return
John Nesbitt, Terry Nesbitt, Tom Myers, Beth Koch-Huston and I were in Steele every day the week of March 8 facilitating art pick-up and shipping. Beth Koch-Huston processed the artists coming to get award checks and pick up unsold art. Thank you to all the volunteers who helped with this task. Thank you to our UPS store owner Patrick Mahomes and his store manager, Jaime, for picking-up, packing and shipping art to buyers and artists.
The Unsung Heroes
Throughout every step of the fair production process there are funds coming in and going out. Richard Borgmann, the Guild Treasurer, and Anna White in accounting make it all happen. Besides the usual invoices and payments, Richard reconciled award monies received with checks issued and sales proceeds with checks cut to artists. Anna White managed W-9s, entered all data and cut checks. We are grateful for their attention to detail and relentless determination to not cut corners!