- The Art of the State exhibit happens every three years
at the Arvada Center.
The show is both by and for Colorado artists,
and this year, the call received over 1500 entries.
- Somehow, they managed to whittle that number down
to about 165 pieces representing artists
from all over the state.
Our assistant producer Mike LeClaire
brings us this story from Arvada.
(resonant music)
- This is called Art of the State.
We do it every three years, so Art of the State 2019.
It features over 136 artistes representing
the art of the state and what's going on,
kind of a slice, a snapshot, a sliver of kind of the energy
and the creativity coming out of the state.
We put out a call for entry across the state of Colorado
and we got over 1500 pieces submitted by over 566 artists.
So it was a lot of works.
We have artists from Paonia, Glenwood Springs,
Steamboat Springs, Greeley, Colorado Springs,
Manitou Springs, a lot of Springs.
(dramatic music)
We sifted through all of these submissions
and ended up selecting 134 artists, 36 artists
with 155 pieces, so about 10%
of all the pieces submitted were selected.
We wanted it to be as diverse an exhibition as it can.
(upbeat electronic music)
(singer vocalizing)
We encouraged people to submit in all media,
so we have from installation to video to video games,
new media, painting, printmaking, sculpture,
photography, literally everything you can kind of think of.
(cheerful music and rhythmic clapping)
We have over 10,000 square feet of gallery space here
at the Arvada Center so it's a very nice venue
to try to comfortably fit as many artists as we can.
And then we have to make sense of, once it's juried,
how do you put it together?
Why is that piece next to this piece and so forth.
(country guitar music)
What's great about this exhibit
is there's a lot of recognizable names
if you're involved with the art scene
of what's going on here in Colorado,
but then there are a lot of new names,
so you have established artists
and you have emerging artists.
I would say we have everything from say a 22-year-old
to a 80, 85-year-old, so it's a nice range and balance.
I definitely think you can find a piece
that you can respond to or challenges you.
You go around the corner and you see that surprise piece
that you had no idea was there.
I can only see that continuing in the next iteration
'cause media change, artists change, styles change.
- From collage to printmaking, paintings,
digital art, sound art and more,
the Art of the State exhibit
showcases artistry from every corner of Colorado.
- That's right and you can visit
arvadacenter.org to learn more.