Walter Jones plein air

What: FCPS plein air event

When: Saturday, Feb. 6, 9 AM to 1 PM

Where: Walter Jones Historical Park, 11964 Mandarin Rd., Jacksonville, FL 32223

Please come join us for our first plein air event of 2016. Let's hope for somewhat warmer weather than we had this past weekend! We will be meeting at Walter Jones Historical Park, a 10-acre park located on the east bank of the beautiful St. Johns River in Mandarin. The park includes the farmhouse, barn, outbuildings, sawmill, nature trail along a riverfront boardwalk, picnic area and restrooms. The park and farmhouse are handicapped accessible.

The park is varied enough to offer different sorts of plein air opportunities, and yet small enough to feel "cozy" so we can all be fairly close together as we paint.

For the water lovers we have that available, as well as woods, paths, and buildings. There should be something for everyone.

Even possible wildlife! I'm looking forward to it and hope to see lots of you there. As usual, please feel free to bring a picnic lunch. We enjoy eating together after we paint, and having a show and tell for those who would like to share their work from the morning. 

Happy Anniversary to us

Wow, can you believe it was 4 years ago this month that we held our first meeting as a Society? Look how far we have come in four years - amazing workshops, great juried shows with fantastic judges, member shows open to all at various venues, and of course a growing membership.

We had 21 people gather for food and fellowship and a great presentation this morning, which included two guests, both of whom joined the FCPS by the end of the meeting!

This morning we were pleased to welcome Tom Carney from Multimedia Art Board, a family-owned company based out of Buford, GA, founded by Tom's mother back in the 80's.

Their product line has grown over the years and now includes surfaces especially for pastels.

Tom brought various items for sale, and a whole bunch of small pieces of his pastel surfaces that we were free to play with and experiment on.

Among their new products are their pastel surfaces on bright background colors, and Tom says these have been popular sellers since introduced earlier in 2015. The surfaces come as 320 or 500 grit, though Tom had only the 320 for us to sample, but a nice fine surface which held pastels well and took layers

Most of us tried a sample or two out. Here is a little 5-minute quickie done on one of the bright yellow surfaces for example. So FCPS members, check your email for a special offer available to us for this coming week only. The site is: http://www.multimediaartboard.com/

Stay tuned for our first plein air of 2016 in February. More details to follow, Keep your fingers crossed for nice weather.