The Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts invites Pennsylvania artists to apply to its Images 2025 Juried Gallery Exhibition.  The exhibition runs from July 1 - 31, 2025 at the Schlow Centre Region Library in downtown State College, Pennsylvania.

The Library’s address is 211 S Allen St, State College, PA  16801.  It is located at the heart of the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts (CPFA), which runs July 9 - 13, 2025 and attracts an anticipated 125,000 visitors.

Delivery of hand-carried works to the Schlow Centre Region Library is on Friday, June 27 from 10 am - 1 pm.  Shipped art must arrive at Schlow Library on June 25 or 26.  Full delivery and shipping instructions will be sent when you are notified about your acceptance.  Retrieval of work after the exhibition is scheduled for Friday, August 1 from noon - 2 pm.

Juror:
Richard Rinehart, Director of the Samek Art Museum at Bucknell University, will be the juror for this year’s exhibition. 

Richard has served as Digital Media Director & Adjunct Curator at the UC Berkeley Art Museum and as curator at New Langton Arts and for the San Jose Arts Commission. He juried for the Rockefeller Foundation, Rhizome.org, and others.

He has taught courses on art and new media at UC Berkeley, UC Santa Cruz, the San Francisco Art Institute and elsewhere. He served on the boards of the Berkeley Center for New Media, New Langton Arts, and the Museum Computer Network.

He led the NEA-funded project, “Archiving the Avant-Garde”, to preserve digital art and has co-authored a book with Jon Ippolito for MIT Press on collecting and preserving media culture, “Re-Collection: Art, New Media, & Social Memory”.

Awards:   
A total of $1,800 in cash prizes will be awarded as follows: Best of Show ($500), Best Painting ($200), Best Pastel ($200), Best Photograph ($200), and 4 merit awards ($150 each).  There is also an award for Best Student Submission ($100).  Winners will be announced at an Awards Reception during the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts on July 10, 2025.

Catalog:
A printed catalog will be produced and distributed at the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts.  An online exhibition will be published on the CPFA website at https://arts-festival.com/images-exhibition-gallery. It will contain the works chosen for the exhibit and a juror's statement and will remain on the website until June 30, 2026.

Commission:
All sales inquiries received by the CPFA will be directed to the artist. A commission of 25% is requested by the CPFA on all sales resulting from the exhibition.  

Please visit https://arts-festival.com/ for more information about other art and music activities at the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts July 9 – 13, 2025.

Application Requirements

For a $35 entry fee, an artist may submit up to 3 pieces of art.  Submitted pieces must be original works created after January 1, 2022.  Digital images must be sized no larger than 5 mb.  The size of framed art is limited to 48 inches on the longest side.  

No more than 2 pieces will be accepted from any one artist.  The submission deadline is May 9, 2025.  Results will be sent by email on May 30, 2025. 

Eligibility Criteria

Images 2025 is open to artists 16 and older whose primary residence is in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Eligible media include drawings, paintings, pastels, mixed media, photography, hand-pulled prints, watercolors, fiber, paper, and digital art.  Works previously accepted into an Images exhibition are not eligible. Submitted pieces must be original works created after January 1, 2022 and two-dimensional.  Allowed entry types are .jpg and .png. All works must be for sale.  Artwork must remain on display throughout the duration of the exhibition.