OLDS — The Olds Art Club’s spring show and sale will not only feature two artists this year, it will also offer a chance to raise money for Ukrainians as they battle the Russian invasion of their country.
This year’s spring show and sale will be held at the Evergreen Centre Saturday April 2 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday, April 3 from 12 noon to 4 p.m.
Featured artists are Cindy Boffey and Doris Fay.
“We’re inviting everyone in the club to do a picture of a sunflower so we can sell those and make a little money for Ukraine,” Boffey said during an interview.
“We just want people to know that that’s going on. Even if they don’t come for anything else, maybe they would come to support that cause and that would be great.”
Boffey said she and Fay are looking forward to the show and being able to meet attendees after they’ve gone two years without shows, due to COVID-19 restrictions.
"We’re looking forward to getting back at it, I think. Both of us are feeling a little bit like, ‘do we have enough stuff?’ But it’ll be what it’s going to be,” Boffey said.
"We have been almost stagnant for the last two years with the art club because of COVID going on. I think the last show was fall of 2020 with Dr. Wray. And then we cancelled the spring show, the fall show of 2021, because every time it would come time, it was another restriction on or something.
“So we thought, ‘now, well now you know, people are not having to mask and that sort of thing and it’s kind of opened up and probably not going to change a whole lot from here on in so we may as well get at it – and get moving anyway, and try to get back to art club and our classes.’”
Boffey found it hard to get much done during COVID – partly because it was tough to get inspired, and because of health issues.
“So we are hurriedly getting ourselves together here for the show,” she said with a laugh.
Both Boffey and Fay work in a variety of media.
Boffey started out in the early 80s as a porcelain artist. She now works with acrylics, alcohol ink, watercolour and some pastels.
Fay says she’s dabbled in art ever since she was a young girl.
“When you could pick up a pencil, mother would give you paper,” she said. “We were an ordinary family, not a lot of money and all that kind of stuff and so that was what she gave us to keep us busy. My brother was really good at cartooning. I couldn’t do cartoons.”
Fay came to Olds in the early 80s. A co-worker at Olds College admired the decorations she made at her window and recommended she join the Olds Art Club, which she did.
Fay does works in pencil, pen and ink, pastels, acrylics and watercolour. She has also worked with oil paints, charcoal and tried her hand at alcohol ink.
She really likes working with pastels and coloured pencils.
