The Crocker-Kingsley Exhibition was first juried in 1940, a tradition that continues to the present day.
Over the past 80 years, this prestigious show has included many premier names in American and California art, including Robert Arneson, Elmer Bischoff, Fred Dalkey, David Gilhooly, Ralph Goings, Gregory Kondos, Roland Petersen, Mel Ramos, Ruth Rippon, and Wayne Thiebaud. In the past, this competition has solely featured California artists. However, starting in 2021, the exhibition was open to submissions from all artists nationally.
Past Competitions
The 80th Crocker-Kingsley Competition was shown at Blue Line Arts in Roseville from January 8th through February 20th, 2021 with Carrie Lederer as the juror. She is an Oakland based painter, sculptor and installation artist who exhibits her nature-inspired work across the United States. Prizes were awarded January 19th, 2021. Pieces chosen by Crocker Chief Curator Scott Shields were on display at the Crocker Art Museum through May 9th, 2021. The show was open to the public and received great accolades. Sales were also very strong. Click here to see the video overview and learn about the exhibit.
The 79th biennial Crocker-Kingsley Competition opened on Saturday, January 19, 2019. David Pagel, an art critic who writes regularly for the Los Angeles Times was the juror. He is also a professor of art theory and history at Claremont Graduate University and an adjunct curator at the Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, New York.
From the over 1900 entries, Pagel selected 80 finalists whose works were exhibited in the galleries at Blue Line and six works selected from the finalists by the Crocker Curators were on exhibit at the Crocker Art Museum in March through May 2019. Blue Line introduced the People’s Choice award offered at the end of the show.
The 78th biennial Crocker-Kingsley juried competition was held spring, 2017. 1591 pieces by 487 artists were submitted. Works represented a diversity of media–painting, sculpture, photography–in a range of artistic styles from representational to abstract to conceptual. The juror for this competition, noted Bay Area artist Squeak Carnwath, selected 41 pieces by 22 artists for exhibit at the Blue Line Gallery and named five prizewinners: Allan Gordon (Best of Show) for “Vanitas Man,” as well as Rebecca Edwards, Steven Davis, Tania Houtzager, and Andy Cunningham. The Crocker-Kingsley artists selected by Crocker curators for exhibit in the Crocker Art Museum were: Mark Bauer, Tyrell Collins, Mikey Kelly, Siddharth Parasnis, and Maryann Steinert-Foley.
The 77th biennial competition, 2015, winners, selected by juror Gregory Kondos out of the 1600 works submitted were: John Crawford (Best of Show), Matthew Peak, Susan Goodmundson, Michelle Andres, and Karen Fess, and Emma Liff.
The 76th biennial competition, 2013, winners selected by juror Michael Duncan, included Adon Valenziano (Best of Show), Patrick Donovan, Tom Gehrig, Andrew Gawel, and Katy Drury Anderson.