River Reflections

Currents: an Evening of Light and Movement

Presented by Florida School of the Arts 

Friday January 17^th public art will come alive on the St. Johns River and its banks in Palatka Florida.  We invite you to come experience the beautiful sights and sounds.  Florida School of the Arts Faculty Robert O’Leary in technical theatre, Freddick Bratcher in modern dance, Dan Askew in visual arts, and their students are teaming up with the City of Palatka and the Arts Council of Greater Palatka to present River Reflections: Currents, an NEA supported project to celebrate the unique beauty and character of the St. Johns River. This project will culminate in an evening of light and movement at the Downtown Palatka Riverfront on January 17, 2014 from 6 – 9 pm. This collaborative event will include sculpture, video, light, music, and dance on both land and on the river itself.

Key to the unique character of the St Johns River is its flow.  Barrier islands of the river’s ancient intracoastal lagoon system prevented the flow east to the ocean.  Instead, the water in the flat valley slowly meandered northward.  The St. Johns River is also unique in that it experiences tidal flows with the Atlantic Ocean to the east through its mouth at Mayport. As metaphor for these properties, a key element to the River Reflections Project is a dragon with heads on both ends. The dragon will be constituted by several segments including the two heads. Each portion of the dragon is the personal creation of sculpture students in the Floarts visual arts program and range from the abstract to the whimsical and will be executed in a variety of sculptural media.

Another element to the River Reflections project will be a video projected onto a floating platform. This video, besides being a framing device for Modern Dance choreographed by Freddick Bratcher and his students, will showcase the work of Design students in the visual arts program at Floarts. These design works were created individually by the students in response to the abstract shape of the River and conceptually in regards to our relationship with the river.

River Reflections is a free event made possible by an Our Town National Endowment for the Arts (Our Town NEA) grant with support from the Arts Council of Greater Palatka, the City of Palatka, the Putnam County Tourist Development Council (Putnam County TDC), and Palatka Main Street.

Design students: Leda Bach, Dylan Bauer, Jillian Beaver, David Brazell, Jennifer Broadbent, Emily Haupt, Victoria Karst, Patrick Kilby, Rachel Ledford, Linzee Mancini, Amber Mckinney, Carly Parsons, Chelsey Patterson, Ryan Plappert, Ken Richards, Daniel Turnage, and Margquiese Wilson.

Sculpture students: Allen Ball, Adell Coulliette, Mackenzie Heavener, Mary Beth Heitapalto, Amanda Jones, Donald Reddick, Carolyn Searls, and Cody Wicker.

Dance students: D. Metrius K. Barry,, Jerry Dawson III, Rozalyn E. Finch, Kacy E. Gibson, Devon C. Kunkler, Dion R. Pratt Jr, Marisa A. Taylor, Gabriel M. Woods, Carly M. Moore, Christopher L. Robertson, and Aris L. Bursell.

Sound Design student: Andrew Crews.

Lighting Design students: Alberto Tellez, Ashley Phillpott, Jason Corriea, Katie Blaylock, Tobias Evans.

PLAN WATERFRONT SCULPTURE GARDEN AND INSTALL FIRST PHASE OF ART WORK

The City of Palatka and Arts Council of Greater Palatka are thrilled to announce the City’s first sculpture in over 80 years has been completed. The creation of a Large-Mouth Bass by Douglas Hays was made possible by a National Endowment for the Arts 2012-14 Our Town grant. The award was one of only three in the State of Florida. Other parts of the grant included River Reflections, a new event, and green print planning for parks and design elements.

Selection Process: Grant writing and realization was led by the following ad hoc Art in Public Places Committee: Jonathan Griffith, City of Palatka; Denise Aiken, Arts Council of Greater Palatka; Charles Rudd, Palatka Main Street; Roberta Correa, Community Liaison, and Christy Sanford, Project Designer. The committee developed guidelines and scoring criteria based on “best practices” material collected by Aiken.

We already hold the new addition in great affection and believe the work will appeal to many. We hope this will be the beginning of a strong collection of art works. Sculpture selection involved a multi-step process.

The Call to Artists, sent out 12/4/12, required the work be river-related. Submissions were presented to 1) stakeholder groups, whose members voted for their favorites and 2) a special Sculpture Selection committee of art group representatives: Wendy Beeson, Palatka Art League; Kay Dueben, Create! the Artists’ Guild of North Florida; Wanda Brown, African American Cultural Arts Council; Alan Hentschel, Florida School of the Arts, and Luke Taft, Arts Council of Greater Palatka. The Art in Public Places Committee also ranked the works. The City Commission approved the selection.

Douglas Hays won the sculpture commission, and his large mouth bass is completed and ready for installation. A slideshow showing the development process is available at the City of Palatka youtube site. The work will be installed on the grounds of the new St. Johns River Environmental Center at the waterfront. The work will have a base that will be a work of art in itself. River-like curves will be engraved with William Bartram passages about the bass. A close competition contender was Jennifer Garrett, and we hope one day to commission a work by her.

Educational Process: The Art in Public Places Committee offered a year-long series of educational programs focused on Sculpture: Art in Public Places. Over the grant period, five working sculptors were invited to give illustrated talks. The following artists chosen by Committee were supported with $200 honorariums from local donors: Douglas Hays (Palatka Main Street), Celeste Roberge (Create!), George Ferrandi (Anonymous), Jennifer Garrett

(Palatka Art League), and Daniel Askew (Downtown Palatka Inc.). Over the grant period, honorariums totaled $1000.

During a Bike Festival, a related show was held at the Downtown Palatka Welcome Center. Sculptor James Lasley was given a $100 honorarium by the South Historic Neighborhood Association. Create! sponsored an Our Town field trip to the Joan Miró sculpture exhibition at the Harn Museum, University of Florida, in Gainesville.

Christy Sanford gave two PowerPoint presentations: 1) Contemporary Sculptors (Louise Bourgeois, Coosje Van Bruggen, Claes Oldenburg, David Nash, Jaume Plensa, Anish Kapoor, Alison Saar, and Maya Lin) and 2) Sculpture in Parks (Storm King, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Gibbs Farm, Central Park, Hirshoren Museum, Botero Plaza, and other settings including parks in Florida).

Fliers and announcements for the following artists are in slideshow format on the City of Palatka youtube site: Douglas Hays, Celeste Roberge, George Ferrandi, Jennifer Garrett, Daniel Askew, Christy Sanford, James Lasley, Nader Tehrani and Robert O’Leary. Samples are shown at the City site.

Signed by Jonathan Griffith and Denise Aiken