Colin Michael Shaw confirms for 2009 Art Invitational

Colin Michael Shaw confirmed yesterday that he will participate in Poetry Scores' 2009 Art Invitational, which will be devoted to the Australian poet Les Murray's great meditation on modernity and vertical space, The Sydney Highrise Variations.

These are just sketches of his, rather than fully realized paintings, but I love them - I love sketchbooks, and even the idea of a sketchbook - so I popped them on up here.

Colin read the poem and said he was struck by some of the imagery toward the end, when Les writes about "600 glittering and genteel towns," so perhaps he will work on something for that imagery, though he has not yet given me a title.

For our Art Invitational, artists make work in response to the poem we are scoring and give the work a title that is drawn verbatim from it. The poem then in effect hangs the show, as we place work on the walls based on where in the flow of the poem the language used for the title appears. So, if Colin sticks with imagery that comes late in the poem, his piece will appear toward the end of the show.

I was gratified to hear that Colin embraces our approach of providing a low opening bid for work going into the Invitational, where we sell the art on silent auction and split proceeds evenly three ways (artist/venue/Poetry Scores). He said he often struggles with galleries complaining that he prices his work too low. Especially when everyone is so broke, I see no other way to go.

The Invitational will be held Friday, Nov. 13 at The Luminary Center for the Arts, 4900 Reber Place at South Kingshighway, right across from Tower Grove Park and a block and a skip from The Royale, where we will have the afterparty.

Other than Heather Corley, whom I roped in some time ago, Colin was my first confirmed artist for the show, though I believe Poetry Scores board president Dianna Lucas already got a yes from Jon Cournoyer and there are a number of us making invites. In fact, I got another yes today that I'll tell you about tomorrow. I'll keep you posted, literally, as the confirmations come in!