Art In Action strives to fund Longwood Art Program

By Lisa Palmer

Since last year, Art in Action volunteers, Betsy Nielson, Lisa Palmer, and Monica Talley have been working together to help create cedar adirondack chairs painted with personal interpretations of some of the world’s most notable artists. These chairs have been created with the intent to help fund Longwood elementary’s art program. Unbeknown to many people, is that our art program is a volunteer, not funded by the state or county school system program. Consequently, funds have had to been found through other venues. In previous years, PTO, principle’s discretionary funds, parent and volunteer donations, and SAC committee grants have paid for the art supplies that our children used in this program. That along with the time and effort that our unpaid volunteers devoted to instruct and inspire our children has been the workings of our volunteer art program.

The creator of this program, Betsy Nielson, (a retired art teacher) has been central to the continued existence of Art In Action. She created the curriculum and recruited volunteers, scheduled and ordered art supplies and taught art as well. All just like a paid teacher would have done, but without any financial compensation for it. Unfortunately for Longwood, Ms. Nielson is going to have to curtail her volunteering here at Longwood because of an anticipated move to Colorado, but she doesn’t intend to abandon Longwood without a art program. This is where the scheme for the art themed chairs sprang from. Ms. Nielson has hoped to create items artistically based to help fund our art program with the ultimate goal of earning enough funds to hire a teacher to continue on in her position of lead art teacher.

The program depends upon some continuity of it’s personel and hiring a teacher would certainly supply that demand, but in these challenging economic times of educational budgetary cutbacks, it is up to the Longwood family and it’s supporters to help raise these funds.

Our artistically inspired chairs are one of our efforts to achieve this goal. We have already sold two of the chairs. One was a Chagall inspired flamingo creation. The other was a twist on Monet’s water lilies (It had a flamingo in it too). Both painted by AIA volunteer Lisa Palmer. The good news is  that we have more of the chairs to sell and as an extra bonus to Longwood’s students, children volunteers helped to create them as well. We currently have in stock a Vincent Van Gogh inspired chair painted by Longwood alumni Anna Sellers and Patti Yoo, a Picasso inspired chair painted by Virginia Watkins and Betsy Nielson, a Jackson Pollack inspired chair by Nolan Palmer and a Mondrian inspired chair by Kosmos Watkins. All of these chairs can be purchased and picked up at Longwood Elementary with the exception of Virginia Watkins Picasso chair which is currently being shown at a FWB downtown art gallery, the Art Lair, which is home to the not for profit art organization Northwest Florida Arts Association (www.nwflaa.com). Executive Board member, Holly Bain graciously agreed to display Virginia Watkins Picasso chair in the gallery’s current show “Stealing Picasso” (ends March 12). Given that the mission  of the Northwest Florida Arts Association is to get everyone involved with the arts and to support growth in the arts, it wasn’t a difficult decision for Ms. Bain to make, that is, to include the chair in the gallery show. Lisa Palmer being a member of the organization and working on the chair as well really sealed the deal. To those who wish to view Virginia’s Picasso chair in person, the Art Lair is physically located at 196 Miracle Strip Prkwy, FWB, in fountain square. The other chairs can be viewed at Longwood elementary by appointment. The chairs range in price from $250 and on up. (Contact: Monica Talley 461-0506).

Monica Talley, our contact for the chairs has also been running another program to help expose children to creating art and to help fund the school art program as well. She and Betsy Nielson have dubbed it the “Art Cub”. It is an after school program that occurs once a month on the early release days that are scheduled into our county school system’s monthly calendar. The Art Club runs from 1:00 to 3:30 to coincide with what time Longwood Elementary would normally release and it cost $20 per session. The Longwood children receive art instruction and are rewarded in their efforts by their creations, but what is terrific to the volunteers is that they know that the money that their efforts have earned will go towards funding the regular art program that all the children at Longwood Elementary get to experience, regardless of their ability to pay.

Additional items that are available for sale to fund our art program are glassware that has been painted by the volunteers and children of Longwood. It runs $5 to $10 a stem and is dishwasher safe. There are also hand painted fabric totes that cost $5 a piece. Our team takes commissions and we are constantly trying to come up with new ideas to raise money for our program that integrates art with our with our goal to continue to expose the children to the opportunity to create art.