Celebrating the Beauty of the Mountains: Two National Arts and Crafts Conference Posters
by Kate Nixon
Longtime attendees of the National Arts & Crafts Conference at the Grove Park Inn all over the country have these annual works framed in quarter sawn oak. Those who want to continue their collection will find some much-needed good news with the return of the National Arts and Crafts Conference to the Grove Park Inn for an in-person weekend of seminars, Small Group Discussions, book club discussions, and naturally, the 35th National Arts and Crafts shows. For the 35th year, attendees will get two posters for the price of one.
From left to right: The poster art for the 35th National Arts and Crafts Conference done by Shawn Krueger of Shawn Krueger Fine Art and the poster art for the 36th National Arts and Crafts Conference done by Keith Rust of Keith Rust Illustration.
As the 2021 virtual conference did not have a poster to send out to its supporters, the offerings for the 2022 conference are making up for lost time, offering the posters. Typically in a given year, the National Arts and Crafts Conference give their annual poster to all conference attendees with the intention of providing that year-long reminder of the dates of the next year’s conference so attendees can always remember the next date. The annual poster artists have ranged from Yoshiko Yamamoto to Laura Wilder to Julie Leidel and other artists with a special interest in the Arts and Crafts style. In 2022, the beauty of the outdoors and the surrounding Blue Ridge mountains are shown in varying styles in both posters, courtesy of artists Shawn Krueger for the 35th conference poster and Keith Rust for the 36th conference poster.
For the 2022 poster, Shawn Krueger of Shawn Krueger Fine Art brings his skill in painting landscapes to not only portray the iconic rusty red roof of the historic main inn, but the warmth of an autumnal day in Asheville. “While this iconic Inn is the part of the reason we return to Asheville year upon year, it strikes me that if it weren’t for the mountains that surround, Seely and Grove would likely not have built the Inn in the first place,” says Krueger, an annual exhibitor with the annual Grove Park Inn conference. “So it felt quite natural for me to give the setting equal billing in the composition.”
Roycroft Renaissance Artisan Keith Rust of Keith Rust Illustration returns as one of our poster artists as his work is also displayed for the 2021 Conference poster that was handed out in February of 2020. For inspiration, Rust also displayed the romanticism of a Blue Ridge mountain sunset amongst the trees. “The emphasis for the majority of my paintings is to celebrate the astounding natural beauty found all around this scenic country,” Rust writes. “For my second National Arts & Crafts poster I chose to focus on the breathtaking sunsets that transform the colors of the vast tree covered rolling hills surrounding the historic Grove Park Inn. To set off my image, I looked to the influence of Charles Mackintosh for the inspiration of my decorative border motif.”
To register for the in-person conference at the Grove Park Inn and receive both posters upon check-in, please visit arts-craftsconference.com by clicking the link here.
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Just a reminder for the National Arts and Crafts Conference book club:
The first book club selection will concentrate on the book “Making Magic: The Marion Mahony Griffin Story” by Glenda Korporaal, while the second session will be a special session concentrating on the classic “The Great Gatsby” as portrayed in the novel form and two theatrical forms. The two sessions, on Friday and Saturday respectively, will be led by longtime conference supporter and attendee Pat Bartinique.
https://arts-craftsconference.com/book-club/