Card Shop

Art Trading Cards (ATC) are miniature works of art on 2.5-inch-by-3.5-inch pieces of card paper and traded like baseball cards. The minis are created using a variety of mediums – drawing, painting, dotting, collage, photography, calligraphy – carried out in everything from pencil and crayon to inks and watercolor. Each one is unique and labeled with a title, artist’s name and contact info.

Anyone can make them, from professional artists to amateurs, and the point of the hobby is to trade them with other card makers. CORE New Art Space hosts trading sessions on Saturday mornings — but now the gallery is presenting an exhibit, the second annual Denver Trading Card Show, which begins today at noon in the Core Annex. “Some of the people who organize this are going to take some of their private selection of cards, along with other cards they come across, and put them on display,” explains CORE spokesman Bruce Clark. An artists’ reception and additional trading session take place tomorrow from 6 to 9 p.m.

Opening in CORE’s main space is The Figurative Show, a juried, open exhibit featuring artwork depicting the human form in any medium. “With this, we don’t know exactly what we’re going to get,” says Clark. “The juror has carte blanche as to what makes it into the show. It will probably include photography and sculpture. I would also guess watercolor and oil painting, and probably some non-traditional mediums we hadn’t even thought about.” Both shows run through May 24 at CORE, 900 Santa Fe Drive; for more information, go to www.corenewartspace.com or call 303-297-8428.
May 7-24, 2009