PJ BOYLAN PHOTOGRAPHY

I’m happy to report some successes with my entries in my local and state camera club competitions. In my local club, the PhotoPictorialists of Milwaukee, my entry “Elephant Meets Land Rover”, won the Farber Award for the Best Photojournalism Print of the Year. In addition, I won the proficiency award in photojournalism slides and two of my photojournalism images won ribbons.

In the WACCO (Wisconsin Area Camera Clubs Organization) spring competition, I won three medals and two ribbons:  medals for the Best Portrait and Best Alternate Portrait in the general slide category, and Best Nature in the small monochrome print category; and two ribbons in the large monochrome print category.

The winning photos in each category in the WACCO competition will be posted on the WACCO website:  http://www.wisc-camera.org/

Bad news–I have had to close my merchant credit card processing account. I can still accept credit cards through PayPal. The issue with credit card processing outside of PayPal is the exhorbitant fees. For a small, seasonal, low volume business, the fees are prohibitive. Recently, I was hit with a large new annual fee and the bank is applying it RETROACTIVELY! How fair is that? So I closed the account but they are holding me responsible for it anyway.  (  So, unless I can find a processing company with reasonable terms, please come to the summer art fairs armed with cash or checkbook. I will accept your personal check with identification. Also, we can arrange payment using PayPal. Thanks for your patience and understanding.

The Photographic Society of America, an international photography organization, is celebrating its 75th anniversary of existence this year. As part of the commemoration it has published a book–”The 75th Anniversary of the Photographic Society of America.” The book features selected images from members of PSA. My photo, “Blue Eyes”, was chosen as one of the featured images. The book, a fine limited edition work, sells for $50 plus shipping and may be purchased on the PSA website using PayPal. 

Here is the link:  http://www.psa-photo.org/

The quarterly Gallery Weekend in Milwaukee is April 17-19. Although set mostly in the third ward, galleries all over the city are participating. I will have new photos in two locations. One is the members exhibit of the Coalition of Photographic Arts starting with an opening reception on Friday, April 17th. This will again be at 320 E. Buffalo above the VP Gallery. The member exhibit will be up throughout the week following Gallery Weekend by appointment and open to the public the weekend of April 24-25.

The second location for me is the Art Bar in Riverwest at 722 E. Burleigh St. where I will have three photos in the annual senior exhibit there. This exhibit also opens during Gallery Weekend with a reception on Friday, April 17th and runs until the end of May.

I did it again! A jury has selected one of my photos, “Derelict”, for a traveling art exhibit. My piece and that of 24 other artists will travel from May 1, 2009 through March 31, 2010 to various locations in the Milwaukee area as the Lifetime Art Competition.  An opening Gala celebration will be held on Thursday, May 7, 1-3pm at Harbour Villageat 5700 Mockingbird Lane in Greendale. EVERYONE is invited.

“Travel the World Without Leaving Home” is the title given by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee to a short course I will be presenting at the Grand Avenue Milwaukee campus this spring. Go to this URL to see program information and to register: http://www4.uwm.edu/sce/course.cfm?id=17543 . For 3 Tuesday evenings from 6:30-8:30pm, I will show photos of three of my recent trips abroad and discuss my experiences, including what I learned about the people, culture, food, politics, religion, etc. The first program is on April 21st about Vietnam and Cambodia. (Hear about my being stuck in Cambodia because of the Bangkok airport closure.) The second program on April 28th is about Egypt and Jordan. The Nile (from a hot air balloon) and the ancient city of Petra are especially spectacular. On May 5th we experience my safari in Africa (Botswana, Namibia, and Zimbabwe) with side trips to Soweto and Capetown in South Africa. Capetown, I think, is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. I hope I can do it justice in the short two hours we have for this program. Come and join us!

I’ve been asked to present a short course in the spring for the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s continuing education division titled “Travel the World Without Leaving Home.”  There will be 3 two-hour sessions April 21 and 28 and May 5, 2009. I wanted to let you know to save the dates in case you are interested in attending. The first session will be about my upcoming trip to Vietnam and Cambodia. The second will cover Egypt and Jordan and the last will be on my December, 2007 safari in Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe plus short visits to Soweto and Capetown in South Africa. In addition to showing my fantastic photographs ))  there will be an educational component in that we will discuss some culture, history and/or current events concerning those countries. Watch this page for registration information.

I apologize for those of you who may have tried to find me at the Fine Arts Festival in Wausau. I had sprained my ankle badly at the same time I was packing to move my household and studio and I had to cancel my participation at the fair. Because my computer was not up and running there was no time to contact my list of art friends. 

I can now take photo orders again. Also I definitely will be at the fine arts festival in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin September 27-28. It’s a lovely time of year in Wisconsin and Elkhart Lake is a lovely place to spend that weekend. So–come to the fair!

Unfortunately, I have had to set my gallery page options to not accept comments. The reason is that the page is being spammed a LOT. There must be software programs with robots that automatically leave a long list of URL’s on the page so that their pages get higher rankings with search engines. I end up having to constantly delete them. Since this takes up too much of my time several times a day, I tried installing a Captcha program which is supposed to prevent this but it didn’t work. The spam programs must have a work around. So instead, I set the options for no comments at all. We’ll see how this works….. But you can still leave comments here on my blog…PLEASE! I want to hear from you.