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Artistic appreciation flows

A.B. Word (seated) and her husband, Barrie Bryant, display their Best In Show award they collected during the 15th Gulf Breeze Arts Festival last weekend. The couple traveled nearly 2,000 miles from Wyoming to make their first appearance at the show. Word paints stunning pastels in the imaginative realism genre. Joe Culpepper/ Gulf Breeze News The jury is in, and the 15th Gulf Breeze Arts Festival was a success.

Despite Saturday showers and threats of more on Sunday, visitors patronized the annual arts festival at Gulf Breeze High School on March 14 and 15 to view and purchase original pieces by artists from around the country.

"It went very well," said Sue Warner, Festival Director. "I think the artists were very pleased."

Warner did suggest, however, that better weather might have produced an even better crowd.

"We had a lot of inquiries about the weather from people in Pensacola and other places surrounding Gulf Breeze," Warner said. "I'm sure that it affected the attendance this year."

According to Warner, the weather did not affect festival-goers' appreciation of the artwork.

Joe Culpepper/Gulf Breeze News Artist Kate Owens of Navarre appears to have the attention of one of her oil painting subjects, a border collie, during the 15th annual Gulf Breeze Arts Festival. "We had a great number of buyers," Warner said. "I saw a lot of art being carried out. There were some serious pieces of art being bought."

By "serious pieces," Warner meant pieces that sold for over $500.

The awards list boasts over 20 winners in four categories - Best of Show, Awards of Excellence, Awards of Distinction and Awards of Honor.

The Best of Show honor went to A.B. Word, who traveled 1,866 miles from Kirby, Wyo., not far from Yellowstone National Park, to participate in her first Gulf Breeze Arts Festival. Word paints in pastels, and her husband/agent, Barrie Bryant, rounds out her paintings with custom, handcrafted frames.

"I paint in a style called imaginative realism," Word said. Her paintings are of subjects that cannot be photographed or observed directly, such as spirits, fairies or other fantasy or history.

Bryant is a student of pictureframe history.

"I hand-craft all the frames, and I try to carry framing forward," he said. "I don't just buy molding and slap it together. I actually handcarve. I do gold-lacing and gilding work, and work in steel and other materials."

Bryant said the drive from north-central Wyoming to Gulf Breeze took four days.

"If you wind up going through Louisiana, you spend a few days eating and it takes a lot longer," he laughed.

The couple, in addition to being pictured in Gulf Breeze News today, is also being featured by the St. Petersburg Times today, Bryant said. Word won Best of Show in the Largo Central Park Artist Market fine arts show two years ago, and the couple is returning to Tampa this weekend for Sunday's 2009 event.

"We've never had such publicity like we've had from the St. Petersburg paper," Bryant said. "Every time we show up in the Tampa area, something comes out about us being in the show. Tampa receives us very well, and now it looks like Gulf Breeze does, too."

Artist Jerry Lewis was the lone award winner from Gulf Breeze for his work with mixed media. His painting of a dog's face hung in the Members' Show gallery inside the Gulf Breeze High School Band Hall.

He was one of nearly 150 artists who displayed their work at the festival, which according to Warner has been so successful due to one important feature - location, location, location.

"The artists like this show, especially because of the community and the people that live here," Warner said. "We had a lot of them say that they are excited about coming back, so we must be doing something right."

GB ARTS FEST 2009 AWARD WINNERS