Karen Mathis’s oil painting, Sunset Sail, has been chosen as the image promoting Chesapeake Chamber Music’s Festival 27 to be held in Easton, St. Michaels, and Centerville from June 3 through June 17, 2012. The image will be the centerpiece of CCM’s poster promoting the Festival, as well as other publicity associated with the two-week event. Contestants were asked to submit work that portrayed the beauty of the setting for the Festival’s musical offerings. The winning painting will be auctioned for sale at the Chesapeake Chamber Music Gala, March 3, 2012 in Easton, MD.

Mathis’s painting was chosen from among 43 images submitted by 16 Eastern Shore artists. This is the first year that local artists have been invited to submit paintings for selection as the Festival image and many talented artists contributed works for the judging. CCM will again invite artists to submit images for the 2013 poster in July of 2012.

Mathis, who holds a degree in design from George Washington University, began painting her landscapes in watercolor and later progressed to oil. Her love of painting and the outdoors naturally led her to paint “En Plein Air” across the United States, Canada and France. Her most recent selected juried exhibitions and awards have included Plein Air-Easton Annual Competition and Arts Festival (2010), Paint Annapolis Plein Air Competition (2008), as well as the St. Michaels Art League Show (2008).

In photo: Don Buxton, Executive Director of CCM, with board members Bernice Michael, Chloe Pitard, and Margaret Welch congratulate Karen Mathis on the selection of her painting.