A photograph of broken cloud cover over Skaneateles Lake, taken by a Skaneateles native, has been selected for a nationally-renowned juried art exhibit and will compete for award-winning recognition next week.
The photo, “Home for the Holidays,” was taken by John Ridgeway, a new media digital marketing consultant who lives in Fair Haven, N.J., but was born and raised in Skaneateles.
“I was very excited about it,” Ridgeway said of his photo being chosen for inclusion in the 33rd annual juried art exhibition at the Monmouth Museum. “A lot of my high school friends have commented on it and said it makes them homesick about not being in Skaneateles for the holidays.”
The Monmouth Museum juried art exhibition has been showcasing and selecting artwork since 1979. This year, juror Island Weiss, a respected artist and art dealer of the Island Weiss Gallery in New York City, accepted work from 68 artists out of 400 entries submitted. The contest was opened to all artistic mediums except film/video.
The accepted artists were announced Dec. 22. The exhibition opening and announcement of four monetary juror awards and four honorable mentions will take place Jan. 14 at the Monmouth Museum.
“It was especially exciting to be part of the selection made by such a high-caliber artist as Island Weiss,” Ridgeway said. “I’m eager to meet him on the 14th.”
Ridgeway’s accepted artwork was a 4.5-by-6.5-inch, 35 mm photograph of Skaneateles Lake, which he took during Thanksgiving 2010. It was the only entry he submitted.
In his submitted artist’s statement, Ridgeway wrote, “I am constantly recording images with either a camera or my sketchbooks. One of my favorite subjects are the clouds in Upstate New York, the home of ‘lake effect,’ where the cold grey winters will suck the life out of anything. This photograph was taken while we were walking to Skaneateles on a Thanksgiving afternoon and the [John] Constable-like sky was really cooperating that particular day. I was trying to capture the immense scale of the sky, lake and boathouses along the lake’s shoreline.”
Ridgeway grew up in Skaneateles and graduated from Skaneateles High School in 1977. He has studied fine arts, art history, graphic design and illustration; he also has a master’s degree in integrated marketing. He has worked as a senior executive in the digital marketing industry for companies such as Merrill Lynch, J.P. Morgan Chase and Vonage, and currently has his own consulting business, John Ridgeway Designs.
He moved to the New Jersey/New York City area to be closer to the advertising and marketing center of the East Coast. His mother and two of his siblings still live in town.
“I love the town,” Ridgeway said, adding that he returns home to visit on holidays and during the summer as often as he and his family can. He has several notebooks of artwork concerning Skaneateles, the lake, the town and surrounding area, which he has created through the years.
Photography and drawing is “a passion more than a hobby,” he said, and is something he did in high school and college. “It’s always been my desire to pursue the arts on a full-time basis. It’s a long-term interest of mine.”
Ridgeway’s photograph, “Home for the Holidays,” will be for sale for $250 at the Monmouth Museum exhibit, and prints also are available for sale by contacting him directly.
To contact John Ridgeway email him at [email protected], or visit his website at johnridgewaydesign.com.
For more information on the Monmouth Museum exhibit, visit monmouthmuseum.org.
Jason Emerson is editor of the Skaneateles Press. He can be reached at [email protected].
