Shorebird Festival!

Avocets Afire 16"X8" on stretched gallery-wrapped canvas.

In-progress photo of a work recently accepted for the Grays Harbor Shorebird Festival's art show at the Ocean Shores Coastal Interpretive Center. The show opens in a couple of weeks and celebrates all the shorebirds migrating through the area. This is a mixed media collage work that uses one of my avocet illustrations I did last year as a reference image. It uses cut- and torn-paper ephemera, hand painted collage papers, acrylic, alcohol ink, and crayons. It sits atop a canvas with a 1-1/2 gallery wrap, painted on 5 sides. I used to see a gazillion avocets during breeding season...they congregated on salt ponds near the Dumbarton Bridge and Coyote Hills (SF Bay area). The intensity of their red coloration fades to white/grey later in the season.

Both parents incubate the eggs for about 23-25 days. Chicks can leave the nest shortly after hatching and find their own food. The female avocet's bill is more curved than the male's. (No, I dunno why.) This work will be for sale, with proceeds supporting shorebird study and protection in the area as well as select local arts programs. If you're local, check out the activities related to the show which will include a demo of how to paint a shorebird by local art superstars, Tim Russow and Karen Fox. Health and mobility problems will probably keep me from spending much time at the show, but you can join my FB group tor all the info.