Mixed media in Donna Brown’s natural dye class.
Congratulations to Mitchell County Animal Rescue, who have been named the 2014 Nonprofit of the Year by the Mitchell County Chamber of Commerce. MCAR operates an animal shelter and offers low-cost spay/neuter and vaccination services. Many Penland staff members and Penland-affiliated artists have been involved with MCAR as volunteers and board members and have also donated their work to numerous MCAR art sales. Thank you, MCAR, for your valuable service to our community.
There’s a ballet school in my neighborhood. When the sun hits the glass a certain way, the front window of the studio dims from where I view it from my car, and all I see are legs and feet, sweeping and stuttering together. Walking into the glass studio yesterday I was reminded of the feeling: catching sight of a group of bodies acting and reacting to each other as part of a plan. Students in Brian Corr’s concentration workshop moved in slow and quickening formations: standing, starting, leaning, kneeling, turning, crossing, holding and dropping and wiping off singed tools. Not a fluid dance (is there such a thing?) but a strategic and elliptical choreography as mesmerizing to me as any big-time production of Swan Lake. As Frank Sinatra played in the background, Brian’s students scuffed and stepped, keeping the object–a large, blue vessel composed of two parts to be joined–alive on the punties. Above are some shots of the moment.–Elaine Bleakney