SaltSpring Photography Club

April 2025 - Library

16 people came to the library programme room for the first in-person meeting since last Fall. It was lovely to see everyone!

Shows around town:

Elehna de Sousa will be showing photos in Country Grocer in May

Avril is showing something new at Gallery 8. The 'Symbolically 8' show runs from April 11th - 28th during gallery hours. The opening night is Friday 11th, 5pm - 8pm.

Seth's 'Undiscovered Country' show at ArtSpring exhibits work by 7 island artists and runs from April 5th - 21st. 10am - 4pm.

Royal British Museum: Reminder to go see Wildlife of the Year on now until April 27th.

Eclectic Visions update:

 Judy has put out an email to see if there is more interest amongst club members to join the show which presently has 20 participants with two members taking two spots. The cost is $75 but the experience of showing your work in a professional gallery is very satisfying.

We can have a small table in the middle of the Saturday market and one of our billboards to advertise the show. If it's raining someone can walk around handing out flyers. Curt suggested handing them out on the two Saturdays of the show, May

17th and 24th. Any volunteers?

Country Grocer has donated wine and a $200 gift certificate which we can use to buy food. We need a server for the wine, someone who has taken a Serving it Right course. Zena, who works at Gallery 8 might be available.

Thrifty's has also given us a $200 certificate for food and flowers. Shout out to our local grocery stores!

Judy has found a $50 gift certificate at the new restaurant 'Feast' (in the House Piccolo restaurant location on Hereford Avenue.) This will be for the People's Choice award.

Seth will send out the Signup genius form so participants can fill in their sitting  schedule preferences. This will be opened up to non-participating members in case someone would like to help out and be part of things. One person for each shift (3 1/2 hours)and two people each for the opening night shifts (5pm - 6pm and 6pm - 7pm.)

Gabrielle Jensen who runs Gulf Island picture Framing has offered the club a 25% discount on frames and a 10% discount on other framing needs. (250 537 1299.)

Crown Framing at 111 Robinson (250 931 2122) also offers club members a 10% discount at any time.

Potential locations for future Eclectic Visions shows were discussed. Gallery 8 is quite pricey at $1800 for the 14 day show.

Other ideas were; renting Gallery 8 for only one week.

SS Fine Art Gallery on McPhillips Avenue their back room rents for $500 for 3 weeks and good openings. They take 30% commission .

Summary: they design poster, advertise via social media, newsletter and website, staff the reception, process sales for $500 and 30% commission - for a 3 week show. longer show, less commitment, we don't have to sit the for the show, less space to show 14 ' x 18' x 20' x 15' wall space - photos can be double or triple hung.

The Bateman gallery at ArtSpring. A long, windowless gallery with lots of wall space and 1/3 cost of renting the whole gallery.

CAPA - Judy brought some magazines, Winter 2024 and Spring 2025 to hand out to the club to peruse and pass on to other members - please return at the meetings for others to take home.

 April 9th meeting at Library

Seth Berkowitz did a talk on pinhole photography.

Worldwide Pinhole Photography Day is Sunday April 27th this year. It's the last Sunday in April, annually event. Seth's talk on how some digital cameras can do pinhole photography, as opposed to the traditional film or paper methods. https://pinholeday.org/

Monthly meetings:

May; Next month's meeting will be EV participants showing and talking about their images for the show. The themed slideshow (for all members) will be 'what you would have chosen' for people not in this year's show and ' what you didn't choose and why' for those in the show. Should be interesting!

We will also discuss duties for sitting the show and how to make sales and keep track of the sales.

June and July currently have no speakers. Would anyone like to do a presentation of their work? Or an aspect of it? Let Judy know if you're interested.

August; Malcolm Carmichael will talk to us about shooting sports. He is a sport photographer who covered the Whistler Olympics and is the official photographer for the Whistler Mountain Ski Team.

September; The library room is booked so we might meet at Harbour House. To be confirmed.

October; Back to Zoom meetings. Mike Moats will give a talk on macro photography.

The Tourist Information Centre has recently been given the Club's slideshow of Saltspring images which they are showing on a screen. Their hours are 11am - 2pm with hopefully longer hours later in the season. They are looking for volunteers.

Curt and Gwen have a fairly large matte cutter for sale. Contact Curt at curtfirestone@gmail.com if interested and you can hash out a price with him.