On the final day of of Arts Fest, the Albin Polasek museum was open with free admission for a day. I was informed that some plein air panters would be on the property painting that day. The painters were there to help promote the Winter Park Paint Out which will be happening between April 23rd and April 30th. I decided that was my cue to sketch some painters at work. It was a beautiful sunny day and the gardens surrounding the historic building were in full bloom. I walked around hunting for artists at work. There was one artist set up on the large lawn behind the home but as I approached he started to dismantle his easel. Just my luck, he was finished. I walked down to the benehes which sat right on the lake then walked back to the house. When I passed the chapel, and stood in the portico, I noticed that Hal Stringer was set up in the driveway working on a small painting. An Albin Polasek sculpture titled “Mother” stood with its back to me. Something about how the warm light filled in the shadows appealed to me.
Guests of the museum often approached Hal and he was very generous with his feed back. For instance he asked a little girl if she liked to make art. When she said she did, he told her to never stop making art if she enjoyed it. I later discovered that Berto Ortega was working on a painting inside the museum. He stopped out to say hello and unfortunately was called away because of a family emergency. I never got to see the painting he was working on. When I finished my sketch I rushed over to Rollin’s College’s Annie Russel Theater hoping to get into a play that had just started. There were no Arts Fest tickets left so I abandoned the idea of sketching the play.