Celebrating 100+ years of venerable history and five generations of Oak Park Art League Artist Members, this biannual exhibition presents a curated showcase of work by OPAL’s current membership.
Artist Members are invited to exhibit works that best represent their studio practice.

The exhibit includes an online component that will serve to record and archive Artist Member involvement at OPAL in 2024. 

In this rendition of the Oak Park Art League’s annual figure and portrait open-call exhibition, contemporary viewpoints are sought that portray the figure and face, paying homage to this tradition of figure study and life drawing that OPAL has encouraged and sustained for its long history.

We welcome the new year with an open-call exhibition for artists to show their most recent work from. All work must have been completed within 2023 and not exhibited at OPAL before.

November / December - Artist Member Winter Exhibition

No theme. No judges. Open Call. Must have been created in the past 4 years and be no more than 42” in any direction.  Must be an Artist Member for this exhibition but you can register to become one ($100 annually) when you deliver your work. This will be the finale to the exhibition schedule for 2023, so don't miss this chance to show what you want!!!

This exhibition opens Thursday May 18 (1-6pm) with a wide variety of local and regional artists presenting their best works, including painting, sculpture, photography, printmaking, fiber arts, and ceramics.

This exhibition is generously sponsored by the:

GOOD HEART * WORK SMART FOUNDATION

Making our communities a better place - one child at a time!

This is an Open Call exhibition for artwork that best represents the artist's understanding and practice of the visual language of shape, form, color, texture and line.

Abstract art, “also called nonobjective art or nonrepresentational art, … in which the portrayal [recognizably specific] of things [objects, life forms] from the visible world plays little or no part.”

For all artists who utilize the human figure and/or the human face, as the dominant content of your artwork, this is an Open Call exhibition for you.
This is the never-ending narrative of figures and faces.
Show yourself and your subject in this exhibition and add your voice.

Let's see what you've got! We want to see what you did in 2022. All work must have been created in 2022 (NO EXCEPTIONS). This is an Open Call. The work you submit will be included if it meets the Call criteria. Deliver your work on the drop-off dates below.

Often considered to be art in its most direct and fundamental form, drawing has expanded beyond marks made with charcoal on paper. In its most traditional sense, the act of drawing depicts the observation and continued practice of mark making by the artist. The artist creates a narrative with their choice of drawing materials and ways that line, proportion, scale, subject and positive & negative space are depicted. The physical process or act of drawing con-temporarily includes additions of other mediums, while staying true to the act of creating a line on a surface to create an image.

Bigger is not always better. The rejection of working on a large scale can be prompted by available materials or space to work, or simply the artist's interpretation of macro to micro. Artistic creation on a grand scale once depicted importance, power or influence of subject and artist. Today, work created on a much smaller scale is no less important, influential or powerful. Rather, its creation offers a more intimate relationship between artist and subject and its completion offers that to subject and viewer. This exhibition celebrates the innovation of artists that work on a small scale - whether by necessity or intended message.

Abandoned spaces can evoke feelings from fear to idyllic nostalgia. These places can be artifacts of history, contain traces of earlier life, offer chances to reflect and give shelter or new opportunities for development and use.

Throughout time and across most cultures, artists have created abstract art. It unfolds and reveals itself in time and layers, needing space to develop and grow. And artists have distinct views on the outer world that goes beyond the literal, and through non-objective art expression, the viewer obtains a glimpse into those innermost perceptions.

Beat the winter blaahs! The Oak Park Art League is transforming its Carriage House Gallery into an artistic winter “hot house” as a retreat from the cold & grey of the deep winter months. This exhibit will celebrate the vibrant floral colors that spring and early summer bring upon arrival.

Figures & Faces, is an open call group exhibition that celebrates the practice and study of foundational & representational skills needed in drawing, painting and sculpting the human form with competency.

OPAL’s Art & Ornament Market is an opportunity to exhibit and purchase original handmade works of art and decorations for yourself or holiday gift giving.

As OPAL wraps up its Centennial year, we are asking our Artist Members to select one work of art that best exemplifies their current or practice. Because the pandemic has affected artists' creativity in different ways, we are open to accepting work that was created within the last 5 years.

Powerful art reflects the issues of the time it was created, commenting on injustices, inequality, subversive forces or subconscious collective behaviors that are called out and called on to create or advocate for change.

Celebrating its centennial year, the Oak Park Art League (OPAL) proudly announces a national call for art work with Beyond 100: A National Juried Exhibition. OPAL is looking for work that best demonstrates the artist's use of materials and mastery of skill in their chosen medium.

Art and music have a deep and resonating relationship. And the creative process of either can be affected by the other.

This is a judged exhibition.

This judged exhibition celebrates the innovation of artists who create work on a small scale and in a broad range of media and styles. We encourage artists to test their artistic abilities and explore the many different realms of art created on a small scale. OPAL is asking artists to transport us into a visual world that brings attention to the tiny details and invites us to take a closer look.

From illuminated manuscripts to digital technology, artists have learned to harness the power of words to create art. The Treachery of Images or “Ceci nest pas one pipe” (“This is not a pipe.”) by Magritte gives viewers a chance to understand his work, and that of others, in a whole new way.

Link to Virtual Tour here!

As part of OPAL’s Centennial, we are asking our Artist Members to select one work of art that best exemplifies their current or past practice.

Link to virtual tour here!

“There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward you can remove all traces of reality.” - Pablo Picasso

Link to virtual tour here!

“Art helps us identify with one another and expands our notion of ‘we’ - from the local to the global.” -Olafur Eliasson

How do our recent experiences of isolation inform the way artists think and work?

It has become all too common to see redacted faces and obscured mouths & noses, by our new reality - the facemask. In this rendition of OPAL’s annual figure & portrait exhibit, artists are encouraged to present their new understanding of the human face, form and figure beneath a mask of their interpretation.

As one of several countdown events to the Oak Park Art League’s 2021 Centennial, Holiday 100 is both an art sale and fundraiser, designed to benefit community artists, art patrons and OPAL.

During the 100 days leading up to OPAL’s Centennial Year, Artist members are invited to submit one piece of work that best exemplifies their current body of work.

To speak abstractly about the meaning of dissent, social change or even art seems a hollow discussion without addressing current events that are happening in America today. On May 25th, 2020, George Floyd was murdered in Minneapolis by a policeman kneeling on his neck. Despite pleadings from Mr Floyd that he couldn't breathe and onlookers that the officer should stop, despite being filmed, the attack went on for over eight minutes. Sadly, this was not new or isolated. In fact the pleas of not being able to breathe eerily echoed those of Eric Garner's last words. But this act has resonated across America and the world in no small part because it occurred in full knowledge of being filmed, illustrating for all that in America, in 2020, Black people could be killed with the same impunity illustrated in the photographed lynchings from the last century.

In our hyper-connected, contemporary society the term “under the influence” is often associated with notions of illicit drug use or the effects of excessive alcohol consumption. But every one of us is under the influence of something - our past, our family, the political climate, social media, peer groups, other artists and more. Whether good or bad, by choice or unconsciously drawn, influences and influencers change our behavior, beliefs, thinking, values and culture. Artists are the mirrors of culture, so what influences you?

Celebrating ninety-nine years of creative endeavors, this biannual exhibition features self selected work from OPAL Artist Members that best exemplifies their current practice.