By Will Grunewald
Bucking a COVID-induced worldwide lull in the art market, Maine galleries and artists saw a surge in sales this year, according to recent reporting by the Portland Press Herald. Here’s guessing that trend carries right on through MECA’s always-popular end-of-year arts and crafts sale, which is moving online on account of the pandemic.
348
Tickets sold to last year’s raffle for works by jury-selected featured artists. Tickets cost $5 and benefit the MECA Student Scholarship Fund.
54
Vendors represented at the sale this year, primarily a mix of students, faculty, staff, and alumni.
3
Number of floors the sale occupies in a normal year in the school’s flagship Porteous Building, on Congress Street.
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Works by MECA alumni vendors, top: chickadee print, by Josh Brill (’00); gallery (clockwise from top left): stoneware teapot, by Adrian King (’12); Baxter State Park’s Ledge Falls, by Caren-Marie Michel (’78); wooden sculpture, by Don Best (’81).
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One longtime Portlander and MECA administrator’s best guess as to the first year of the sale, which has gone on so long that nobody at the school seems entirely sure of when it started.
22
Days the sale runs this year, as opposed to its usual two. It kicks off on November 20 with an opening Zoom reception and runs through December 11.
4,000
Visitors to last year’s in-person sale.
Top: Josh Brill, Chickadee Dee Dee, Giclée fine art print on archival photo matte paper; Gallery (clockwise from top left) Adrian King, Teapot, soda-fired stoneware with various slips; Caren-Marie Michel, Ledge Falls 1, acrylic on canvas; Don Best, Looking West, wood.
