An artwork site featuring paintings and art dolls

Paint the Town is on hiatus until next spring due to personal issues. 

Paint the Town is an extremely informal plein-air painting group for painters of any level (using any medium) living in the near-north and near-northwestern suburbs of Chicago, Illinois, USA.  Of course, visitors from other areas may join us as well.

To avoid stepping on the toes of a long-established, major group of plein-air painters in the Chicago area, this group will limit its activities to places within an easy driving distance of the near-north/northwestern suburbs of Chicago.  No one should ever have to buy a plane ticket or book a hotel room for one of our gatherings.

News about our next meeting is in the last paragraphs of this page and on the Calendar page of this site.

We meet on a Sunday morning once a month in a park, forest preserve, or other scenic area within the Morton Grove, Niles, Park Ridge, Skokie, Des Plaines, Glenview, Evanston region.  To start with, I am selecting the location in advance and placing it on a calendar on this website.  Eventually, if there is enough interest, I'll start a website for the group that is independent of this site and the regulars will select their own favorite painting locations for the group.

There will be no membership dues, and information on sources for plein-air painting supplies will be provided upon request, as attendees must bring their own supplies.  I only ask the following:

(1) An understanding that each meeting is "nature permitting;" that is to say that we will not meet if there is (or has very recently been) heavy rain, a big snowstorm, lightning, flood, tornadoes or other nasty events, thick fog, very high winds, unbearable cold (below 24 degrees F, which I consider "unbearable" for the purpose of painting), a swarm of disease-laden mosquitoes, etc.  For more information on weather-related meeting cancellations, see the "It Sucks, But..." paragraph at the very bottom of this page. 

(2) Respect for one another, including time, space and work.  I'm afraid this includes not bringing children who are younger than 11 unless you are prepared to watch their every move yourself and paint at the same time .  Artists younger than 18 must be accompanied by an adult.  Also, we'd love to meet your non-artist friends...in a different setting.  Please bring just yourself and perhaps one friend or family member along, not an entire entourage. 

And please, no political or religious discussions.  We're going to be there to have fun and get away from it all -- not to babysit, argue, or proselytize. 

(2a) Also, please be aware that if you show up early or late, you may come away disappointed because "no one was there."  If that's the case, we honestly don't want to hear about it.  Meetings start at 10:00 and end a half hour later if attendance is small or nonexistent (we wait for a 1/2 hour to allow for traffic conditions and the fact that a lot of people like yours truly tend to get lost).  And while we don't necessarily shoo everyone away at the end of the meeting at 1:00, be aware that whoever manages the property we are using at the time may choose to do so.

(3) Respect for nature.  Nature is, after all, providing our subject matter for these gatherings, and it looks a lot better without litter all over it.  Please leave each site as clean, or cleaner than you found it, and use non-toxic painting materials (nowadays this is possible even when using oil paints!).  Do not dispose of any materials on-site even if they are non-toxic.  Everyone in the group will be their own clean-up crew, although I'll bring along a box of garbage bags if I remember.  I hate to bring up such a negative at this early stage, but the rare individual who refuses (or even "forgets") to clean up after him/herself will be requested to permanently remove his/her presence from our vicinity, if you catch my drift .

(4) Please bring your own refreshments (and sunblock and bug spray!); however, there will be no alcoholic beverages, smoking, or drugs allowed.  No collecting (as in: yes that frog is cute; no you cannot take it home), or weapons or hunting.  As mentioned previously, each artist should bring his/her own art supplies.

(5) No soliciting of any kind (i.e., do not come to the meeting looking to sell your paintings or art instruction, nor expecting to receive art instruction, or anything else that may involve an exchange of money).

There is no need to RSVP.  Just be aware that if there is some weather, personal, or "nature" problem, you may arrive at the site and find no one is there (and of course, if you show up way early or way late, no one will be there).  Since I will not have anyone's phone number, I will not be able to call off a meeting beforehand unless people are willing to sign on to this site and look to see if the event is still on the calendar.  I will try to be diligent about taking events that aren't going to happen off the calendar far enough in advance for it to be helpful for you.  Eventually, however, I'd like to see events happen even when I can't be there.

Here's a list of nature-related automatic cancellations of Paint-The-Town! meetings: