Great Art at a Great Price

We have started to prepare for our third annual "Your Night, Their Future" fundraiser for the LFT Foundation. Each year we try to find interesting items to auction and raffle off. I remembered that the Prairie Land Gallery in Pontiac was having a going out of business sale. I went by the gallery and found a wonderful golf print. It is "The Seventh at Pebble Beach" by Larry Dyke. The limited print is beautifully framed and is signed.

I also bought a Steve Hanks print my wife has been admiring for a long time. It was 50% off and much cheaper than I could find anywhere online for the signed limited edition print. They have many signed prints from great artists like Thomas Kincaid, Charles White, Terry Redlin, Dave Barnhouse and many others.

Please plan on going by the Prairie Land Gallery to look at the prints, collectible plates and figurines. They are closed right now preparing for their final sale. Give them a call at (815) 844-7100 to see when they will be open again. Trust me it is worth your drive!! When you call or go to the Gallery please make sure your tell them Thanks for supporting the LFT Foundation!

The Prarie Land Gallery also donated another beautiful framed print "Frederick The Literate" by Charles Wysocki. We will have this print on one of your auctions. I will be uploading a picture of this very soon.

Following is a wonderful description of this print:

Want to know how to catnap with a smile? How to smell a rat? Everything you wanted to know about the Killer Sparrow of Ipswitch but were afraid to ask? It's all here and more in Frederick the Literate, Charles Wysocki's wonderful print for all cat and book lovers.

These are any cat's dream books, from 'Field Guide to the Garbage Can' to 'A Tale of Two Kitties.' And don't miss the authors, who include such international best-selling catty writers as Thomas Cheshire and Kitty Mewpur.

Some fine art prints really need no introduction. This is one of them. All you need to do is look, read the first book's title, and off you go. "It's a technique I used years ago to get people to look at the entire painting," Charles Wysocki explains. "I would put signs in the window of a shop or on a wagon, and the curiosity of people would come into play. Naturally they wanted to read what was on the signs. Before you know it, you've got them hooked into your painting!"

But the joys of Charles Wysocki's most witty work yet will be readily apparent to anyone who loves a great book, a beloved pet, or a good joke. "As soon as my wife, Liz, and I came up with the idea for this painting, we knew we had to do it," Wysocki says. "We're all very dedicated and serious about our artwork, but there's always time for humor. Liz and I spent breakfasts, lunches, and dinners thinking about the book titles." After all the years doing more subtle 'story' humor, as in the recent Beauty and the Beast, Wysocki says: "All my more obvious puns were piling up. They had to come out!"

It's all in homage to a very special feline. We're both cat lovers," says Wysocki. "We have sever. But the painting is dedicated to the real Frederick, who was one of our favorite cats, if not the favorit. But now he's in that 'library in the sky.' So this print is dedicated to him."

Happily, Frederick is now immortal, in that special place where cats dream of fish, field mice, and a world where the feline comes first.