The Register-Herald, Beckley, West Virginia

Local News

June 16, 2009

Program launched in Greenbrier

Tina Alvey

LEWISBURG — There’s quite a buzz stirring about a project initiated by Art in the Park Community Arts. Bumblebuzz is the name given to a bicycle/sculpture designed to enhance the study of pollination.

Funded in part by a Black Rock Arts Foundation grant awarded to Art in the Park director Jessica Levine, the 2009 Pollinator Appreciation summer program melds community art-making activities with the creation of butterfly gardens with native plants.

Bumblebuzz will change as the project evolves, Levine says.

“It can illustrate different environmental concepts,” she explains. “The bike sculpture can be taken where environmental education is happening. We are buddying up with events that are already happening and giving people another activity, creating impromptu opportunities for young people to participate.”

The Pollinator Appreciation activities include visits by Bumblebuzz to the Lewisburg Farmers Market on June 20 and 27 from 10 to 11 a.m., and to the Ronceverte Farmers Market on June 30, also from 10 to 11. The bicycle/sculpture will also be featured in downtown Lewisburg during the First Friday celebration on July 3.

Other activities include sessions focusing on pollinators and wetlands on June 22 from 6 to 8 p.m. at 318 N. Court St., Lewisburg, and planting a butterfly garden at John Wesley United Methodist Church on July 11 from 2 to 5 p.m.

“All of the activities are free of charge, open to all, young and old,” Levine says. “Young people must be accompanied by an adult, but each activity is appropriate for all ages.”

Based in San Francisco, the Black Rock Arts Foundation shares a common philosophy with Art in the Park, a connection that led Levine to apply for grant funding from the foundation.

“I went to their Web site and read their mission statement. They are committed to work that is interactive and connects people to one another in a community,” Levine says. “I wrote the grant to honor what they’re doing.”

Other Black Rock grants went to art projects in such diverse locations as Moscow and Rio de Janeiro, as well as points in the United States from New York to Los Angeles. “We are still fundraising for the pollinator project,” Levine points out. “We’re producing a flip book that will illustrate pollination, and extended the deadline for donations for that project. Those who contribute will have their names in the book.” The deadline for donations for this project is June 20. For more information, go to www.dottywood.org.

— E-mail: talvey

@register-herald.com

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