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The 2023 Southern Tier Biennial runs Saturday, September 16 through November 4th 2023

Reception and Awards Ceremony, Saturday, September 16, 3-6 PM 

Peg Bothner Gallery at the Tri-County Arts Council in Olean, NY.
Since 2005, the Southern Tier Biennial has given rural artists the opportunity to take part in a juried professional art competition and gallery show. Every two years, artists from across New York State’s Southern Tier region submit their work to be juried by a new panel of top art professionals. The result is a stunning array of work showing the vitality of the visual arts in rural New York!
The 2023 Southern Tier Biennial Artists
This year 51 pieces from 36 artists were accepted from the 157 artists who entered over 400 works of art!
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The 2023 Southern Tier Biennial Artists: Anne Auld, Barbara Behrmann, Tammy Renée Brackett, Chloe Bryant, Eva Capobianco,
Frank Chang, Paul Cwikla, Victoria Eckley-Brown, Nancy Nixon Ensign, Jodie Estes, Hans Gindlesberger, Lindsey Glover, Ed Green, Marshall Green, Aaron Harrison, Katelyn Heins, David Higgins, Andrea Kastner, Jimmy Keller, Madison LaVallee, Barbara Mink,
​Gabe Morton-Cook, Timothy Pauszek, Brian Payne, Jim Root, Michelle Schleider, Laura Jaen Smith, Joe Sorci, Cesilia Tucker, Kari Varner, Jane Walker, Chris Walters, Anna Warfield, Rob Whitcomb, Todd Wolfe, and Glenn Zweygardt

Download the Catalog
​*Please note, "Bronco" by Jimmy Keller should be listed as oil and acrylic, not silverprint and soda ash. We apologize for this error and the mistake has been corrected in the downloadable catalog.

Some artwork from the Southern Tier Biennial is available for purchase.
​Please visit the Tri-County Arts Council Market Page for pricing and availability. 
​The 2023 Southern Tier Biennial Award Winners:
The award winners were selected in person by our 2023 jurors. One best in show, one Juror's Choice, and three Honorable Mentions were given out. 
​Best in Show
Best in show receives $1,000, plus a solo show in 2024 with a $2,000 stipend 
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​Tammy Renée Bracket 
Buck Up Buttercup 
Deer hide, thread, stainless steel grommets 
22”x21”
​Juror's Choice
The Juror's Choice receives $750
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Jane Walker
Holding the Leash
Archival Digital Print 
26”x22”
Honorable Mentions
Each Honorable Mention receives $500
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​David Higgins
Hump Day 
Oil onPanel 
18”x24”
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Kari Varner
Rosignano Solvay 
Silver Gelatin Print Developed in Soda Ash 
8”x10”
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Anna Warfield
Slow Reverse
Original poem, hand dyed muslin, polyfil, thread, hardware
​48”x18”x18”
The 2023 Jurors:
Andrea Alvarez, PhD is Associate Curator at the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, where she has worked since she joined as a Curatorial Fellow in 2017. Most recently, Alvarez coordinated a site-specific commission by Firelei Báez (2023), an exhibition of Lucas Samaras’s Mirrored Room (2023), and a co-curated off-site exhibition of sculpture by Sarah Braman (2022). Other curatorial projects have included organizing Comunidades Visibles: The Materiality of Migration (2021) and The Swindle: Art Between Seeing and Believing (2018); and co-organizing the Buffalo AKG’s presentation of We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85 (2018).
From 2014 to 2017, Alvarez was Director of Exhibitions at Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts, where she organized student, faculty, and alumni exhibitions, created interdisciplinary activities and programs, and taught Arts cross-disciplinary courses. She has previously held positions at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia, and Fundación Guayasamín, in Quito, Ecuador.
Alvarez earned her PhD from the Department of Art History at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2020, where she previously earned her Master’s degree. She received her bachelor’s degree in Art and Art History from the College of William and Mary.
Alvarez’s curatorial focus is on contemporary art, with a particular interest in the work of Latinx and other artists of global diasporas.
​Judy Barie is a Fine Artist and Curator.  She splits her time between Pittsburgh PA and Chautauqua NY, where she has served for the past 16 years as the Director of the Chautauqua Visual Arts Galleries in Chautauqua Institution. Her contemporary abstract paintings have been shown in one person and group shows across the country, and reside in  corporate collections, personal homes and museums. After earning a BFA from West Virginia University, she spent a year-long printmaking residency at Atelier 17, now known as Atelier Contrepoint in Paris, France. 
    Barie applies her aesthetic vision to curate several exhibitions in the CVA Galleries each summer. The mission of the CVA Galleries is a commitment to introduce the audience to artwork that is inclusive, inventive, and created by professional and emerging artists. There is a  focus on building strong relationships and conversations with collectors, art enthusiasts, curators and those new to contemporary art, resulting in a universal support of artists both financially and professionally. CVA strives to be an incubator for some of the most talented working artists today, while encouraging others to discover their craft.  The galleries are a place to educate and inspire a growing audience on the importance of appreciating and living with art, while exploring an artist's vision and practice.
Tullis Johnson, Curator and Manager of Exhibitions and Collections at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, in Buffalo, New York, has organized more than 40 exhibitions of contemporary and historical art. Through his writing on Charles Burchfield, he is an emerging Burchfield Scholar. Respected for placing the work of Burchfield into a contemporary context, Johnson’s scholarship continues to break new ground in the understanding of the artist. His exhibition Blistering Vision: Charles E. Burchfield’s Sublime American Landscapes, examined Burchfield’s role as a link between the American naturalists of the 19th century and the environmental movement emerging in the second half of the 20th century. He co-curated, In the Fullness of Time, Painting in Buffalo, 1832-1972, an exhibition accompanied by a 240-page hardcover illustrated catalogue. He currently manages the curatorial staff at the Burchfield Penney. Johnson received his B.F.A. from the Visual Studies Department at the University at Buffalo earning the Eugene Gaier Award for Excellence in Printmaking.
About the Southern Tier Biennial
Founded in 2005 to make a measurable and positive difference for rural artists, the Southern Tier Biennial affords artists an opportunity to take part in the process of a professional art competition and be rewarded for those efforts. Past shows were tremendous successes, with hundreds of artists entering, creating exhibitions that showcased the vitality and diversity of visual art in the region. Each biennial is juried by new jurors and, therefore, the shows they create are different in tone and scope yet equally true to the definition of "a regional survey of visual art.” 
Accepted works are exhibited in the stunning Peg Bothner Gallery at the Tri-County Arts Council in Olean, NY. This project is produced by the Tri-County Arts Council (Formerly the Cattaraugus County Arts Council), the Cattaraugus Region Community Foundation, and made possible by an endowment from the estate of F. Donald Kenney. 
F. DONALD KENNEY
F. Donald Kenney was a graduate of Olean High School and Holy Cross College. He went on to earn Master of Arts and Master of Business Administration degrees from Harvard University. Kenney, who died in 1997, devoted his life to international investment banking and served as chair of Harriman Ripley International and Merrill Lynch International prior to becoming chair of Goldman Sachs International Corporation from 1976 until his retirement in 1984. Kenney served as chairman of the Board of the National Academy Museum and School of Fine Arts as well as on a number of international arts boards including the International Council of Museums, the Finnish Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Ireland–America Arts Exchange, and the Irish Museum of Modern Art.
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