Chairman's Message
The nightmare is really starting to end!
Beyond question, the current 2005 ARC Salon™ puts to rest one of the most offensive claims made about realism.
We have all heard modernists say that,
It has all been done.
There is nothing realism can say any more that has not already been said by those who were far better.
That is just as absurd as saying the same thing about literature or poetry.
It has all been done!
Or theatre, dance, or music.
Not only has it not all been done, but quite the opposite is the case.
The last 500 years is but the beginning of what the human mind is capable when it comes to the potential compositions, themes, and techniques available to Traditional Realism.
The breadth and the expanse of human expression is filled with endless possibilities, as are the heavens and nature itself. We are only just beginning to explore all of the new, poetic, and magnificent ways of expressing the full range of human emotions with beauty, poetry, and grace.
With 1,496 entries in this year's ARC Salon™, the first challenge, to narrow it down to just 100 finalists, was a task of formidable dimensions. There were at least 500 or 600 other works that were but a hair's breadth away from also being worthy of finalist status.
Then to choose the winners, honorable mentions, and all the other awards and prizes was very difficult, and you should all know that there were in fact considerable differences in the choices and preferences of the judges.
But we ultimately did choose, and I know most of you will be as ecstatic as we are with the results. In all, the combination of prizes, awards, and purchase awards to date has totaled more than $215,000 and climbing.
More importantly, nothing in the art world has produced a body of work of this quality since the Paris Salons and Royal Academy exhibitions from before 1910.
I ask every one of our visitors to offer their congratulations to all of the winners.
We are all really winners now with the growth, expansion, and success of the Art Renewal Center® and the ARC Approved™ list of schools, the ARC Living Masters, and now the ARC Salon. And we are once again heading down the road paved by the thousands of great and old master artists of the past 25 centuries.