March 2020 Newsletter
Click here to download a printable PDF version.
The artist’s job is to be a witness to his time in history.
~ Robert Rauschenberg
Artwork by Suzi McKinney
2020 Arts & Wine Festival Update
The 2020 Wrightwood Arts & Wine Festival, a juried festival taking place Saturday, September 19th, wants to share some good news with artists. Mountain High has joined our festival as a Presenting Sponsor!
This means lot more event publicity for artists and our town! We will be collaborating with the Mountain High PR team to advertise the Wrightwood Arts & Wine Festival widely throughout Southern California. More advertising equals more people attending and more sales. The artist application is now available here, for those interested in participating.
Meet Our New Arts Liaison
The Wrightwood Arts Center is please to welcome our new Arts Liaison, Leslie Sikes. Leslie will be responsible for interacting with artists and organizing our art shows. She has lived in Wrightwood with her husband, Darrell, for 25 years where they raised their only son, Derek. Recently retired from teaching at Wrightwood Elementary School, she previously taught grades 1-4 in Fontana and San Bernardino. She has always been a lover and patron of the arts and earned her Masters in Education while working in Integrating the Arts into the Curriculum. Growing up in San Diego she studied dance with many of the prominent local studios and performed with the Old Globe Theater and San Diego Civic Light Opera, aka, Starlight. She has been involved with Snowline Players locally and and has always infused her classroom teaching with art and performance as often as possible. Since retiring from teaching in the public school system, she enjoys gardening, yoga, walking and DIY projects around the house. She loves learning and has become a student of visual art, specifically painting at the Wrightwood Arts Center. She has always been an advocate for arts in education and appreciates the opportunity Joyce has given her to share her love of art with teaching young children.
New Classes at the WAC via Keyboard Art
Keyboard Art School of Music is offering an adult class, “Foundations of Herbal Medicine.” Classes are twice each month, March through May. For more information, visit the herbalism page on the Keyboard Arts website.
There is also a new Teen Workshop Series, March 31st to April 16th, Tuesdays and Thursdays at 4:00 p.m. Through one-on-one appointments and group workshops, Carrie Bershee Coaching specializes in personalized coaching services focused on health & resiliency. Carrie’s signature program, The Thriving Teenager, helps teenagers and young adults build self-awareness, confidence, problem solving skills, and emotional health.
Offered for the first time in Wrightwood, The Thriving Teenager workshop series program is for students in grades 8-11 seeking greater school success, better ability to cope with life’s challenges, and who want to learn how to deal with feelings of stress, frustration and overwhelm. If your teenager is struggling, this program is for them! The cost of the program is $99. Class size is limited to 12 students.
For more information, join us on Saturday, March 21st at 10:30am at Wrightwood Arts for a “Meet The Coach” information session, or visit keyboardart.com. Bring your teen! You can also check out Carrie and her program on Facebook at @coachcarriebershee.
This Month’s Events
Wrightwood Book Club
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
(Wrightwood Library, 6011 Pine St)
The book of the month is When the World Stopped to Listen by Stuart Isacof, “the captivating story of the 1958 international piano competition in Moscow, where, at the height of Cold War tensions, an American musician showed the potential of art to change the world.” Join in the discussion!
2020 Arts & Wine Festival Meeting
4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
This planning meeting for the 2020 Arts & Wine Festival is open to the public. Stop in and see where we are, and how you can lend a hand!
Book Signing: Carrie Bershee
12:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
Wrightwood resident, educator and author Carrie Bershee will be signing copies of her recently published book Built For Greatness: 5 Breakthrough Steps for Understanding Your Child’s School Struggles & The Solutions To Overcome Them. Carrie is a credentialed school counselor with a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and a Master’s degree in Educational Counseling. For over 20 years Carrie has been helping her students identify what is preventing them from being successful and teaching them ways to overcome their challenges. She has had great success working with thousands of young people and their parents. Carrie takes great pride in building strong connections with her students that lead to big breakthroughs and successes. She is also a certified health coach who has conquered her own autoimmune disease, which has made her a passionate advocate for health, wellness, and emotional healing. Combining her extensive experience as a counselor with her vast knowledge of health, wellness, behavior modification, and resiliency building, Carrie has created a 5-step coaching framework that is the foundation of her book and her private coaching services. Applicable not only to school challenges but to nearly every area of life, much of Carrie’s work is built upon the success of her 5-step program.
WBS presents: One Vision Many Voices
3:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
(WW Community Building, 1275 Highway 2)
A benefit concert for A Better Way! Music featuring Gayle & Company, Wild Side Band, Kelly’s Lot, and many more. Inger Robertson, Executive Director of A Better way, Will speak to how the campus values empathy, education, and empowerment. Tickets: $15 online at abetterwaybenefit.com. $20 at the door. Doors open at 2:30 p.m.
Spring Equinox Celebration with Mary Duman
6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
(Love Roots Yoga Shala, 1329 Highway 2, 2nd Floor)
The title says it all. $20 in advance or $25 day of the event. Find more information at loverootsyogashala.com.
Anahata Mousai Sound Bath Healers
5:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.
(Love Roots Yoga Shala, 1329 Highway 2, 2nd Floor)
The popular group returns to Wrightwood from Antelope Valley! $25 in advance or $35 day of the event. Find more information at loverootsyogashala.com.
Next Month’s Events
WAC Membership Renewal Drive
All Month
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
The Wrightwood Arts Center membership renewal campaign begins April 1, 2020. Beat the rush and renew now at wrightwoodarts.com/memberships. Thank you for your support!
Art Exhibit: Patricia Farrell
1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
2020 Arts & Wine Festival Chair Patricia Farrell will feature her stone and bronze sculptures, photographs and pen & ink drawings of local birds and animals. For more information, visit: psfarrellart.com.
Art Exhibit: Patricia Farrell
1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
Patricia Farrell’s art exhibit continues for day 2.
Meet & Greet Patricia Farrell
5:30 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.
(Wrightwood Arts Center, 6020 Park Drive, #5)
Patricia Farrell’s art exhibit closes as the feature of our quarterly meet & greet and annual membership meeting. Come meet the artist, enjoy snacks, and bring a friend!
Classical Concert Series: Spring Concert 2020
3:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
(United Methodist Church, 1543 Barbara Street)
The Spring concert features Todd Rewoldt om saxophone and Lesi Mei on piano. Tickets: $20 pre-order, $25 at the door. $5 discount for 65+ and students. Keyboard Art School of Music students no admission, parents $10. Find more information at keyboardart.com.
Poem of the Month
AND THE WOMEN SAID
by Kelly Grace Thomas
And the women said watch as men call us lottery tickets
watch as they cash register us into gamble into played
out combinations of sweaty bills and pocket want
watch as they lick their lips for that better life
watch as they pout, when we don’t pay out.
When the bling of our breasts don’t make them
Cheshire cat the same. When we got our own debts
that gotta be paid, to mirrors, to mammas, to the way our hearts
traffic light in the closet after we sold ourselves
whole.
And the women said feel the way we became campfire
how we ghost storied into this dangerous beauty.
How them men can’t scrub out our smoke, how our blue learned
to burn slow, standstill like the moment between beggin and maybe.
Feel the way we soil into shovel, how we let ourselves be held even
after a matchbox tongue misspoke of our flames, even after we told flint,
you don’t live here no more. The women said feel how we are not open
fields waiting for their strike. They cannot not bury us
deep, call us things of war and be surprised
when we land mine.
—from Rattle #51
Kelly Grace Thomas was winner of the 2017 Wrightwood Poetry Slam and the 2017 Neil Postman Award for Metaphor. Her first full-length collection, Boat Burned, released with YesYes Books last month. (web)