Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts hosted it’s very first MONOTHON 2007 last month and it was such a rousing success, plans are already underway for MONOTHON 2008!

A total of 76 artists from four states and British Columbia made their way (at their own expense!) to the studio of Crow’s Shadow located on the Umatilla Indian Reservation just east of Pendleton, Oregon.

With the assistance of many, many volunteers, the Board of Directors and Crow’s Shadow’s resident Master Printer, Frank Janzen, the artists produced 365 total prints in the first 2 ½ days of the event. Printed on two sizes of paper (11x15” & 15x22”) the prints were displayed in the CSIA gallery as the prints came off the presses! The talented artists brought the gallery to life with landscapes, animals, still-lifes and abstract images.

On Sunday, November 18th, the third and last day of the Monothon, the doors opened at noon to the public to browse and purchase the prints. The atmosphere was bustling with art collectors from the local community and beyond hurrying to lay claim to their favorite original prints. Many buyers worked on their Christmas shopping and others were only interested in adding to their own collections. We even had artists purchasing prints and contributing even more to the Crow’s Shadow goals.

The total raised that day was over $16,000.00 and to date, close to $20,000.00 has been raised to help get a contingency of Crow’s Shadow representatives and artist to New Zealand in February of 2008. Through the assistance of the Hallie Ford Museum of Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, Crow’s Shadow has been invited by the Pataka Museum of Wellington, New Zealand to exhibit a portion of the permanent collection of Native American prints. Three Native artists, Kay WalkingStick, Phillip Charette and Jeramy Red Wolf will be making the trip and will have the privilege of participating in a four-day workshop with aboriginal artists from Samoa, New Zealand and Australia. The group will also travel to Wanganui, NZ to attend the grand opening ceremony of a new $60 million dollar art facility which includes a printmaking studio.

The Pataka Museum is also donating airfare for 2 of the artists, so the total raised to date will cover the expenses for the trip. The additional sales will provide operating income for Crow’s Shadow, the hardest type of funding to raise.

The Crow’s Shadow Board of Directors sincerely thanks the Monothon committee, visiting artists, studio assistants, and supportive art buyers for making our first event of this kind such as success!