Saturday, July 10, 2010

2010 AAW Symposium - 6/20/10 - Sunday

Sunday at the AAW symposium is always a mixed bag - last minute walk-throughs of the tradeshow, packing up ones instant gallery display, the instant gallery critique, and the PoP exhibit auction. All this is action-packed, but it goes by very fast.

The first thing I did on Sunday morning was a photo assignment for the American Woodturner. Claude Lethiecq had an intriguing display of Chinese ball turnings that had been under glass for the duration of the instant gallery.

I met Claude and Bob Rollings there to remove the glass case and to do some detail images of the turnings. I won't post those pics here until after the journal article is published, which may be much later in the year. This is the display, though, so you can imagine how interesting the individual images will be. These turnings are very photogenic and much, much more complicated than they appear at first glance. It was great to hear all about them and to visit with Claude and Bob.





Claude asked me to do a portrait of fellow-club member Jeffrey Greenwood's spiral, multi-axis turnings. Very nicely matched and well done.











My final walkabout of the trade show yielded some good "street photos." Nick Cook always had a big crowd around his lathe.












Rapt attention















Lyle Jamieson doing some 'splaining.















I attended the instant gallery critique, which featured all of the award winners and a nice selection of turnings spanning the range of diversity in terms of style and techniques.


















Behind the scenes with the first turning to be featured - Peter Exton's AAW Purchase award piece.










L to R: Richard Hogue, Terry Martin, and Marilyn Campbell were the panelists doing the critique this year. I was impressed with how thoroughly prepared they were and the insights they gave on their selections.










L to R: Richard Hogue, Marilyn Campbell, Terry Martin.













Immediately following the instant gallery critique was the Teapot Exhibit auction. I missed the first couple of pieces on the auction block, but caught the action in full swing. There was a huge crowd and some intense bidding going on.










Being up front taking pictures does carry some risk. Everytime I used my flash, John called me a bidder. Unless one is willing to play the game, this is not a sight you want to see during an auction. I did bid on a lot of teapots, but the prices quickly escalated beyond my price point on nearly all of them.















A view of the crowd at the auction.













The bidder on the far right is J. Paul Fennell who was serving as a proxy for teapot collector Sonny Kamm. Sonny purchased more than 30 of the teapots from this exhibit.












Lust or longing - how would you interpret this expression?













"Please? I really, really want this one!"













Auctioned teapots awaiting their purchasers.














More of the same.













This one is mine! I won the bid on Michael Hosaluk's "Self Portrait."















Binh Pho brought out his teapot to display.















After the auction it was time to pack up the exhibits. I took charge of packing my "Acer Embrace" sculpture.














It takes a lot of work to break down these exhibits, but the work goes quickly when people pitch in to help. That's Bonnie Klein in the gray t-shirt.











Awaiting the truck.













Packing up all the plinths and pedestals.

Once again, the AAW symposium was totally amazing and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

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