WSO Convention & Spring Experimental Exhibition

Comes to Bend

Themed An Artist’s Playground, the 2023 Spring Convention of the Watercolor Society of Oregon (WSO) will be held in Bend on Saturday and Sunday, April 15-16. The Riverhouse on the Deschutes will be the venue for an event that includes workshops, presentations, a vendor fair, an awards banquet and a demonstration and workshop by invited juror and renowned artist Vera Dickerson. The convention, which rotates locations around Oregon, is attended by WSO members and their guests and will bring water media artists from around Oregon into Bend.

A key feature of the convention weekend is the opening of the 2023 Spring Experimental Exhibition. This exhibition, hosted at Barber Library on the Central Oregon Community College (COCC) campus in Bend, is a juried collection of 80 paintings by WSO artists, selected by Vera Dickerson. Free and open to the public, the exhibition opening is on Friday, April 14, 4-6pm, and the exhibit will hang until May 26. While WSO’s fall exhibitions focus exclusively on transparent watercolor, the Spring Experimental Exhibitions include a wider variety of media and painting surfaces. “The WSO charter is broad,” notes WSO President and Redmond artist, Rebecca Sentgeorge. “We are not exclusively for watercolor artists, as we embrace acrylic painters and water-based mixed media artists. The Spring Experimental Exhibition is a great opportunity to see that diversity in action.”

“WSO, a nonprofit organization of over 600 artist members, is a community of artists from beginners to nationally known artists, inspiring and supporting each other” says Sisters artist Winnie Givot, past president of WSO. “We are a strong and growing group of artists from Central Oregon, as well as around the state, and we welcome new members who want to be part of this vibrant community.

The WSO Experimental Spring Exhibition opens April 14 at Barber Library on the Bend COCC Campus watercolorsocietyoforegon.com