EXHIBITIONS
We normally hold two exhibitions of members’ work each year, either at Amersham Common Village Hall or at the Chalfont St Peter Community Centre. There is no preselection of artwork for Beechwood exhibitions. The next exhibition will be held at the Chalfont St Peter Community Centre on the 27th and 28th of April 2024. The autumn exhibition will be held at the Amersham Common Village Hall on the 2nd and 3rd of November.
Prizes are presented at our exhibitions for the best painting based on a public vote. The Visitors' Favourite Painting votes are collected during the exhibition and the prizes awarded at the closing event. We send invitations to exhibitions by email to everyone on our mailing list. If you would like to join the mailing list, please read our Privacy Policy then send us an email.
CHARITY
Beechwood donates 10% of all exhibition sales income to charity. The charity for 2023 was The Chilterns Dog Rescue Society, as agreed at the AGM that was held on the 1st March 2023. At the AGM held in February 2024 it was agreed that the charity nominated for 2024 is the Chiltern Food Bank. The donations from both forthcoming exhibitions will go to this charity.
AUTUMN EXHIBITION 28/29 OCTOBER 2023
Once again we hosted a much admired and successful art exhibition at Amersham Common Village Hall. Due to fewer members wishing to exhibit their work, we had less paintings on display and many visitors said they liked the space we had been able to give each painting! We sold a total of 20 paintings (17 framed and 3 unframed) during the weekend and logged a total of 261 visitors - so much the same as this time last year! The home-made cakes and buns were much appreciated by all - one gentleman returning on the Sunday for a second visit and to vote, not only for his favourite painting, but also for his favourite cake!!! That caused considerable amusement when I started collating the voting slips!!!! Sale of refreshments raised £341 and the entry desk collected £121. As these were both healthy amounts we decided, yet again, to increase our donation of 10% of sales to £300 to our chosen charity for 2023, Chilterns Dog Rescue Society.
Despite income from hanging fees being lower due to the reduced number of artists exhibiting, I don’t expect Beechwood to make a loss - hopefully even a small profit! Once all the bills come in I will have a clearer picture which will be shared with you at our AGM next spring. And for those of you who witnessed the chaos caused by the card reader not responding, hopefully I have sorted it out now!!
May I take this opportunity to thank all of you who helped make this exhibition the success it was. There are too many of you to mention and I would hate to forget anyone, so thank you all!!! But a particular note of thanks must go out to the various members who weren’t exhibiting but still responded to our plea for more help in setting up and dismantling the exhibition!
And now to the results of the votes by visitors of their favourite painting!!! It was fairly close across the whole weekend between 6/7 paintings but by the end of the show on Sunday the three winning paintings emerged. I have a list of how many votes each painting on show attracted which I will bring along to our painting sessions on Wednesdays should you wish to see it.
In first place came IAN DAVENPORT for his beautiful watercolour, Dawn At Latimer (which also found its new home!) with 11 votes Second was DINAH KANE for her gentle watercolour, Winter Shadows, attracting 10 votes Third was HEATHER ROOTES for her lovely Snowy Owl, with 9 votes, so cleverly done in coloured pencils!
Well done all of you!!
LIZ GRAMMENOS - CHAIRMAN/TREASURER 5 November 2023