Happy Birthday, AVAM!

Well, AVAM made it to 10! The American Visionary Art Museum is maturing nicely, well maybe mature is not the right word. Then you have to behave, and that's no fun. I can remember back to the beginning, schlepping the architect's model around in my van, with director Rebecca Hofberger, doing the dog and pony show, begging for money to build the museum. Rebecca did the begging, I did the driving.

This past Saturday night, the AVAM staff and board of directors threw a grand AVAM-style party and raised a lot of money! I'm waiting on the total, but it's at least several hundred thousand. The guest of honor was South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Suffering with a cold I didn't expect him to have much to say; however, once he got up to the podium he was amazing and very funny. What an honor to be with him for the evening, and he's a good dancer too!

Rosie O'Donnell MC'ed the live auction. If you forget, before her TV talk show she was a rowdy stand-up comedian. She was great, no one was spared. Her auction style is in increments of one thousand. If you were well dressed or wearing lots of bling, she showed no mercy.

Cheers! May AVAM live to a ripe old age. P.S. If you notice the Baltimore Sun using one of my pictures to illustrate their coverage of the event, my first!

UPDATE: As an artist and frequent donator of work for fundraisers, I always hear the next day," Hey I finally got one of your paintings! I only bid $200.00." I'm happy for them, but it would be nice if it went a little closer to the market value. Well Saturday night was a great surprise. The piece donated by the ever charming and talented sculptor David Hess, went for $15,000.00. That's a new record for the man, thank you David and thank you bidder! I'm looking for a picture.