Gallery featuring local water scenes runs into early July at ArtWorks Center

More than 50 submitted art pieces featuring scenes from the Cedar River Watershed are part of a first-time gallery opening Friday night at the Austin ArtWorks Center.

Numerous professional and amateur artists and photographers have submitted works featuring water at a specific location within the Cedar River Watershed on the Minnesota side.

Co-sponsored by the Cedar River Watershed District and the Austin ArtWorks Center, the show will have an opening reception from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Friday, May 20, in the ArtWorks Center’s second-floor gallery. The seven-week gallery will run through July 9.

“We really appreciate the strong interest in this new event from our local artists and photographers to help us better connect the community to the Cedar River State Water Trail and other local waterways,” CRWD outreach coordinator Tim Ruzek said in a press release.

ArtWorks staff has been great to work with on the idea and done an exceptional job in setting up the gallery, Ruzek said.

CRWD has a mission of “Reviving Our River” relating to the watershed district’s work to improve the health of the Cedar River and its tributaries as well as to reconnect the community with the river, which years ago was a focal point of interest and community activities.

Formed in 2007, CRWD focuses on projects that will reduce flooding and improve water quality in the Cedar River Watershed.

The upcoming ArtWorks gallery features paintings and drawings as well as photographs of the waterways from recent years and from decades ago, including a poster of citizens observing a raging flood of the Cedar River in 1908 at the Fourth Avenue Northeast bridge.

Requirements for participation in the gallery – which required submissions by May 6 – included that the submitted work show water at a specific site in the Cedar River Watershed in Minnesota. The watershed includes the Cedar River, Turtle Creek, Dobbins Creek (part of Austin’s East Side Lake) and other creeks, such as Wolf Creek in Austin’s Todd Park.

Some of the artwork accepted for display in the show is for sale, with 70 percent to the artist and 30 percent to the Austin Area Commission for the Arts, which runs the ArtWorks Center. Staff with the ArtWorks Center made all decisions on items submitted for the gallery.

ArtWorks Center is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays and from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturdays.

The nonprofit Austin ArtWorks Center showcases local arts, provides arts enrichment to children and adults, and fosters a community of artists and art lovers. It hosts Mower County’s only public clay studio and has exhibits on its main and second floors that host gallery shows for professional and emerging artists as well as private collectors.