For centuries artists living in this unique part of the world have echoed and, at times, advanced culture and society. Here Land and Nature, ways of living, and raw materials become subject and object in the hands of artists. Additionally, and surprisingly, early sponsored expeditions to the Pacific Northwest, particularly in the 1800s, included artists who could draw the people, plants, topography, villages, and wildlife found in uncharted lands, and who thereby contributed to regional art history. Artists of today work to appreciate and understand the beauty of the region's ideals, and its people, tangibles, and viewsheds, and to express what they know in a multitude of art mediums. The surfaces of their drawings, paintings, sculptures, and traditional crafts reflect the colors, shapes, and textures of this diverse region, which instills their works of art with cultural value. In this unique locale, artists who express the significance of agriculture and natural resources in works of art, and agriculturists who enable food and fiber production, are people who make major contributions to the gradual, infinite process of redefining this place called the Pacific Northwest.
Art About Agriculture 2009: Across the Pacific Northwest is an art competition sponsored by the College of Agricultural Sciences at Oregon State University. The College invites artists to investigate agriculture and natural resources of the Pacific Northwest as inspiration in the process of creating works of art and selecting submittals for its twenty-seventh annual art competition. This regional, juried competition is open to all fine arts and traditional crafts media. Artists living in Alaska, British Columbia, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington may apply. However, student artwork completed while enrolled in an educational curriculum is not accepted.
Artists may also wish to consider the scope of the College by visiting http://agsci.oregonstate.edu. In brief: the College of Agricultural Sciences is one of eleven colleges at Oregon State University. The University itself is a Land Grant, Sea Grant, Space Grant, and Sun Grant institution. College of Agricultural Sciences departments: Agricultural Education and General Agriculture, Agricultural and Resource Economics, Animal Sciences, Crop and Soil Science, Environmental and Molecular Toxicology, Fisheries and Wildlife, Food Science and Technology, Horticulture, and Rangeland Ecology and Management, and program areas of Bioresources Research and Pre-Veterinary Medicine. Shared departments are in the College of Engineering: Biological and Ecological Engineering, and the College of Science: Botany and Plant Pathology, Chemistry, Microbiology, and Statistics.
Art About Agriculture 2010. Next year's competition will again be open to artists living in the states listed above. The College will be interested in works of art related to regional agriculture and natural resources, and people here who are directly involved with agricultural practice and production and the stewardship of natural resources.
