June 2020 Newsletter
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These are important times to ponder the relationship that art builds with a reader, a spectator, or a listener. Is art a fundamental form of expression, or an avenue for human connection?
~ Laurisa Sastoque, The Daily Northwestern
ResiliArt in Wrightwood
Through the hashtag #ShareCulture, UNESCO has invited everyone to communicate their love of art by sharing it broadly. They have also launched the “ResilArt” movement, an effort described by UNESCO director Audrey Azoulay as, “a period of openness to others and to culture, to strengthen the links between artistic creation and society.”
The arts in Wrightwood continue to thrive under these new circumstances as well, including online classes at Keyboard Art School of Music and online concerts by the Wrightwood Blues Society and Centerstage Wrightwood.
The Wrightwood Arts Center looks forward to continuing to offer classes, meet & greets, and artst exhibits in the future.
In the meantime, though, we would love to share any art you’ve been working on while sheltering in place. If you have any finished works or works-in-progress that you’d like to us to share on Facebook or in these newsletters, just send them to WrightwoodArts@gmail.com. Don’t forget to include the titles, descriptions, links, or anything else you want included.
Enjoy a look at what some of our members have been up to below!
A Note of Thanks
A Wrightwood Arts Center board member matched $500 in donations to two local organizations: The Wrightwood Elementary School PTG Food Program and the Timberline Lions Club/Mana Project. Thanks to the donors that gave the initial donations that were matched! Together, we are helping our community!
Centerstage Wrightwood Virtual Concerts
Centerstage Wrightwood will be hosting a series of concerts online this summer. These Saturday evening concerts run from 7 p.m. – 8 p.m. Basic viewing is $6, VIP tickets include meet-and-greet access for $12. For more information, visit their Facebook page.
Schedule:
June 6 – Greg Jones Band’s “Backyard Blues Night”
June 13 – TBA
June 20 – Davey Ray & an All-Star Blues Review
June 27 – Mystic Mountain
July 4 – Greg Jones’ “A Tribute to the Genius of Ray Charles”
July 11 – Lipstick Red “Live on the Deck”
July 18 – Gayle and Company
Socially Distanced Art
Have a look at what some of our Wrightwood Arts Center members have been up to these last months!
Joan McCandless created this “everyday masterpiece” after William Michael Harnett’s “My Gems” (1888)
Suzi McKinney has been busy painting many pieces, including this, entitled “Sailboat”
Pat Farrell has been working in watercolors for the first time in years
Poem of the Month
SHELTERING IN PLACE
by Barbra Badger
Next to me windchimes
singing softly as a breeze teases through the pines
My prayer rises up on it and is sung back to me
every line.
the view is pleasing but I close my eyes
birds sing their hearts out
the pines over the way … sigh
For this time of isolation
I have prepared all my life.
Loneliness and sorrow were my only friends
Cutting me to the bone with a dull knife
Now after decades of peace within and without
Being separate will be fine until it ends.
Opening my eyes to a familiar sound
A crow cruising by, looking me in the eye
I hear every stroke of his wings through the air
Every stroke of strength and grace
Of the crow drifting by me there
Each of us gloriously happy in our own place.
Barbra Badger is a Wrightwood resident and author of November Starfall.
© 2020. All individual works copyrighted by their creators; used with permission; all rights reserved.