What a great success our exhibition was this year, despite the inclement weather we experienced on Saturday morning we still had a steady stream of visitors, in fact over the weekend we had around 400 through the door.
The Rt Hon Mark Francois, gave an extremely encouraging speech at 1pm on Saturday, in which he praised the quality of work on display. Mark has been a stalwart supporter of the group for some years and usually purchases some paintings, this year was no exception, Chris Wiseman’s ‘Smoke and Steam’ in acrylic was the one he took away with him this year.
There were about 130 paintings on display and we sold 24, very pleased with that and it is a testament to the quality of work.
Comments from the visitors as they left the venue were all positive so all our members should be very proud of themselves, give yourselves a big pat on the back, you deserve it.
We do have the result of the voting from the public which will be announced at our ‘At Home’ social evening on 1st May at the Todman Centre.
The SAA has done us proud again this year for, as well as supplying catalogues, magazines, and banners to give away, they have also supplied our certificates, presentation mugs and several prizes which we will be able to raffle at our meetings.
Our grateful thanks must go to AR Adams Funeral directors of Rayleigh for their continued sponsorship of our exhibition.
Last but by no means least, we have to thank all the members of our committee, without all their hard work this event would not have taken place.
All the best for now, see you all soon and in the meantime, keep painting 
Photos and report by Colin Mossman
RAG 