As the most prestigious realist art competition in the Americas, and perhaps the world, the International ARC (Art Renewal Center) Salon offers over $100,000 in cash awards and international recognition through partnerships with prestigious magazines, galleries, museum exhibitions, and a strong online presence.
Exhibitions
Although availability for a traveling exhibition is not required for entry into the ARC Salon or for winning the top awards in the ARC Salon, there will be a live showing of many of the winners, honorable mentions, and some finalists that will travel from New York City to the MEAM (Museum of European Art Modern), in Barcelona, Spain.
This will be the second live exhibition of the ARC Salon, and the 12th international art competition ARC has hosted.
The MEAM, dedicated to contemporary realism, will exhibit an approximate 75 works from the 12th annual ARC International Salon at their museum. The ARC Salon’s works will be mounted at the same time the MEAM mounts its 9th Figurativas Painting and Sculpture Competition in the fall of 2017.
The MEAM competition is organized by the Foundation of the Art and the Artists, which is, along with the ARC Salon, the other most important competition for representational art in the Western world.
The totality of the exhibition will take place between the spring and winter of 2017, starting at the Salmagundi Club in New York City in May/June of the same year. ARC will also be providing an opportunity for qualifying artists to sell their works at these venues if the artist chooses to make them available for sale.
The Art Renewal Center is a 501(c)(3) non-profit educational foundation, founded for the protection and advancement of traditional art including the training techniques of the old masters.
This year the ARC salon will include a new 8th category for portraiture. This important genre first thrived 5,000 years ago in ancient Egypt. Since then it has always served as more then just a visual record and has been used to demonstrate power, importance, virtue, beauty, wealth, or taste; but most importantly, portraits are intended to capture the soul of the sitter.
In addition, the ARC Salon has teamed up with the Da Vinci Initiative, which is bringing skill-based techniques like those implement by Leonardo Da Vinci and Michelangelo, by offering a simultaneous competition embedded in the ARC Salon for High-school aged students. Through the work of The Da Vinci Initiative, atelier-style schools that have young artist programs, and high school teachers with a passion for skill-based art education, the ARC Salon seeks to acknowledge and encourage the growing skills of these young artists by expanding the ARC Salon to recognize their work.
These works by talented youth will not compete in the main categories of the ARC Salon, but in a separate division specifically for young students. In this year’s ARC Salon, they will recognize at least one of these students and their teacher and school for their outstanding accomplishment in the visual arts, constituting the first international realist art competition for high-school students (age 14--19). The competition is currently open and accepting entries, with a deadline of June 15, 2016.
