Palmetto Hands

For those of you who aren't familiar with it, Palmetto Hands is a fine craft show that is part of the North Charleston Arts Festival. This is the 3rd year that I've participated and each year I've really enjoyed seeing fine crafts from around the state of South Carolina displayed at the Convention Center. If you have the opportunity between now and next Friday, have a look. I was fortunate this year to win an Outstanding Merit Award for my quilt, Honey Locust Beans. Needless to say, I was very excited.

Another of our local quilters, Lucretia Pope had two pieces there and I have included her silk, appliqued vest. I believe she won a first place ribbon at the Cobblestone Quilt Show with this vest and it's quite nice.

I have included a few photos of some of the other crafts represented so you can get an idea of the scope of the show. There were several wooden pieces there. Some were straight forward furniture pieces with some very original ideas. This piece, I believe, was turned on a lathe after gluing together many smaller pieces of wood. (I may be wrong).
This one to the right is a hand-made paper book . I don't remember the name of the artist but she has things in the show each year and they are always interesting.

And this was a wonderful hand-painted dress with peacock feathers along the sleeves. The bowl to the right is hand-woven from some kind of metallic fibers. There were several pieces by the same artist and they were all beautifully wrought. (Please double-click on any of these photos for a more detailed viewing experience)

The wall hanging to the left had a lot of hand-painted and stamped details. That is something that I would like to try myself sometime but I'm just not there yet.

And the final piece is a wonderful glass plate with a beautiful, intricately detailed center. It seemed to shimmer as we looked at it. And these are just a few of the wonderful works of art there. For me, personally, it is interesting to compete with artists from other media. As a judge, I don't really know how you can compare the "apples and oranges" of fiber, clay, paper, metal, wood, etc.
After we looked at the Palmetto Hands exhibit, we looked at the painting exhibit out in the hallway. There are so many very talented artists in Charleston and though I didn't necessarily agree with all of the choices for awards (it is, after all, a subjective process) did think that the Best of Show was incredible and I'm sorry I don't have a photo here of it. It was a black and white modest nude drawing (I say modest because you couldn't see any of the essentials) of a young woman. It was very low-key compared to many of the other paintings but it drew you in.
So, this was my "cultural" experience for today. Tomorrow, it's Celtic music at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in North Charleston (again, part of the Arts Festival).