the Painting Activist

I could hardly believe my eyes as I turned 360 degrees on Saturday to witness the behemoth project I had spent so many months coordinating unfold onto the pavement in vivid color.  This street painting festival was part of the first annual Champions 4 Her walk/run festival benefiting 10 Kentucky charities serving women and girls.

The goal was to raise $100,000.  1,680 runners, 75+ community street art participants, 9 local artists, and 1 international renowned street painter later we raised more than $150,000.  Not too shabby for a first go, eh?  To see more event photos, go to my flickr account.

Not even a week has past and I’m already hearing a buzz about being tasked with breaking a street painting Guinness World Record next year (hopefully donations raised are proportional).

Click here for a direct link to the Champions 4 Her video.

I have spent at least the past six months coordinating the street art festival for an upcoming umbrella fundraiser for 10 Louisville nonprofits. One week from today (Saturday, June 21), ‘Champions 4 Her‘ walk/run will launch its first year at Waterfront Park.

Initially, I was asked to scout and hire an internationally renowned madonnaro (street painter) to set the festival apart from the plethora of other walk/runs in the city. I loved the idea, but immediately thought of the truly unique opportunity the concept of a street painting festival afforded clients of the 10 organizations we were raising money for. I agreed to find a feature artist for the event to draw in the media, but pitched the additional idea of having each of the beneficiary partner organizations create their own amateur street paintings depicting how their respective nonprofit assisted women and girls in our community.

The idea was not hard to sell, and soon I was also hiring a team of local artists to guide the novice nonprofit participants through the process of a creating a roughly 8′ x 12′ chalk pastel painting in one day.

I saw a lot of wide eyes as I sat in on the introductory meetings between the art teams and the artist they were paired with. This is the first time many of the participants have been to exposed to the visual arts on this level. Working with a full-time professional artist has really expanded their perception of the abilities of the arts to impact a community.

Within a few weeks I was getting concept sketches of each group’s final design. It has been such a treat to get photos in my email inbox and snail-mailbox of the art they’re designing.

You can support these wonderful organizations by registering yourself or a team to do the walk/run, or just come by and see the art in action.

I did of course hire a feature professional artist for the main street painting. Her name is Tracy Lee Stum and she will start on her piece the Wednesday before the event. Feel free to stop by Waterfront Park during the day to see her at work. She (and the other street paintings) will be in the parking lot in front of Joe’s Crab Shack.  See you June 21!

9″ x 12″ watercolor, SOLD.
See all artwork available for sale.

This Saturday, March 22nd, is World Water Day. The UN initiated international day of awareness has sparked activities around the globe such as “World Water Walks,” art competitions, and documentary film viewings. The latter is happening in Louisville this weekend at Baxter Avenue Theater. ‘FLOW (For Love of Water),’ co-produced by phenomenal local arts rock star, Gill Holland (of Gallery NuLu and sonaBLAST! Records), will be shown for a week at the theater beginning tomorrow.

Snag tickets early for Friday’s showing to make sure don’t miss the opportunity to meet the film’s director, Irena Salina, who was apparently tear-gassed in addition to receiving a death threat while making the film. I just bought my tickets online for the 7:30 showing on Friday. See you there?

18″ x 24″ oil on canvas, SOLD.
See all artwork available for sale.

Are you happy? Would you say you’re a happier person than a citizen of a neighboring country? How do you measure happiness?

A 2006 study calculating happiness by nation has added a new unit of measurement to the typical equation of income and access to quality health care and education. Inserting the new variable seems to be based on the theory of “what goes around, comes around.” The Happy Planet Index reminds us that we live in the environment we help create by naming ecological sustainability as one of its 3 primary indicators. No one wants to call smog-filled community without clean water home. The study “shows the relative efficiency with which nations convert the planet’s natural resources into long and happy lives for their citizens.”

A more traditional study would likely name a Scandinavian country such as Denmark the world leader of pleasure and contentment. The Happy Planet Index bestows the title to the unlikely candidate of Vanuatu, a small freckling of islands in the South Pacific that only gained its dependence from Britain and France in the 1970’s.

Analyzing life satisfaction, life expectancy, and ecological footprint yields some very surprising results. Mexico and Columbia are 2 of very few countries on the index’s world map positively denoted in green. Give their survey a spin for yourself to gain a better understanding of information collected for the study. Hopefully you are happy and/because you’re ecological footprint is petite.

30″ x 40″ oil on canvas
Contact me at ashley.cecil (at) gmail.com for purchase inquires.
$50 donated to Flamenco Vivo Carlota Santana
See all artwork available for sale.

Last year I finally made a list of “things to do before I die.” One line on that list read, “take Flamenco dance lessons.” Not long after creating my declarations of commitments to myself, I saw a Louisville Flamenco group perform at the Americana Center for International Women’s Day. The performance was inspiring to say the least, hence this painting.

Benefits and utility exist for such sinfully enjoyable activity like dance, which pleases folks on 2 diametric ends of a spectrum: those involved in dance for personal expression and those only interested in any activity insofar as it is “useful” (ie does is make money or is it trackable on a spreadsheet). Here are a few ways dance nourishes the creative spirit and yields tangible positive outcomes:

• With one-third of children in the US overweight or at risk of becoming overweight, incorporation of dance into school programs is a fun and effective way to combat overdoses of PopTarts and under-activity and boost confidence. Here’s a great example for you research geeks.
• The calorie-busting, coordination-building video game, Dance Dance Revolution, may lead to improved reading comprehension among kids with ADHD.
• A 2003 study showed that cognitive activities such as dancing greatly decrease the risk of dementia. Dancing (3-4/wk) was the only activity that resulted in a 76% lower dementia rate among study participants.
• If a monetary outcome is what you’re after, Dance-a-thons like this one are a great way to raise money for your cause.

So you see, all of your time spent dancing in front of the mirror, singing that horrible 80’s tune you wouldn’t be caught dead jamming to in front of friends, has simply been a preface to employing your talent for a fruitful purpose. Dance on twinkletoes!

5″ x 7″ watercolor in a 12″ x 15″ frame
Click here to see picture of framed painting.
Painting sold to be auctioned here on eBay to raise money for WFP.

Watching Hotel Rwanda last night and anticipating this Saturday’s visit by exiled Rwandan, King Kigeli Ndahindurwa V, has reminded me, in a roundabout way, to mention that this is World Hunger Relief Week. Yum! Brands, one of the world’s largest commercial food manufactures, has joined efforts with the United Nations World Food Programme to address this global issue. Yum! Brand’s efforts are threefold: utilize their powerful marketing capabilities to raise awareness, fundraising (in stores and online, with an additional 7% of the donated amount matched by the Yum! Foundation), and recruiting Yum! employees to volunteer at food banks, to collect donations, and more.

By pulling from Yum! customers at 35,000 restaurants in 110+ countries, the company and WFP hope to raise enough money to feed half a million people. A modest contribution can go a very long way in areas in the most dire need of food. The World Hunger Relief Week website states:

• Giving just US$1 can help five people avoid starvation.
• $10 can feed a hungry person for a month
• $34 can feed a child in school for the entire academic year
• $100 can feed a class of 25 students for a month
• $500 can build a school garden, supplying children with fresh, nutritious produce
• $1000 can provide emergency rations to nearly 2,000 people

I can hardly eat on $10/day, much less $10/month.

With 1 in 7 people in the world going hungry everyday, I hope you’re compelled to give while you’re out to lunch this week. If, like me, you’re not a regular customer at Yum! Brand restaurants (Taco Bell, KFC and several others), you can make an online donation by visiting www.fromhungertohope.com.

Yes, I realize October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but still I’m dropping my jaw at the myriad of places the pink paraphernalia is popping up (the 20′ tall pink ribbon sculpture recently erected in downtown Louisville is just one example). This is quite the popular fundraising phenomenon!

The pink ribbon campaign bug has found its way to one of Louisville’s premier, award-winning eateries, Vincenzo’s Italian Restaurant.  Indulge in their lasagna bolognese anytime during the month of October, and Vincenzo’s will donate a portion of the proceeds to Mom’s Lasagna.  The nonprofit funds cancer research in the name of the 2 co-founders’ mother, Patricia Keeling Schmidt, who was diagnosed with breast cancer during her second pregnancy and later died of the disease.  Her story is truly moving.

So dig in and wallow in your good deed while the ricotta and parmesan melts in your mouth.

5″ x 5″ watercolor in a 12″ x 12″ frame, $175 ($10 donated to the Food Literacy Project)
Click here to see picture of painting framed.

See all artwork available for sale.

Last night I drove deep into rural southern Indiana to celebrate the holiday weekend with friends who recently bought a home with more than enough land to accommodate for a vegetable garden, chickens and goats. Our dinner spread was largely comprised of ingredients fresh from their yard. As anyone who has ever tried to eat locally and seasonally, my friends found themselves with a large over-abundance of a few vegetables, so much so that all guests were given parting gifts of tomatoes.

Eating local produce is an excellent way to support local farmers, revisit the notion that food comes from the ground (not a box), cut down on carbon emissions from carting produce from thousands of miles away, and feed your stomach something it will actually like and use. But committing to such a diet does require some culinary creativity. I love tomatoes, but what am I going to do with 6 of them in one week? Solution: here’s a very simple recipe for 10 Tomato Pasta from the kitchen of Nora Pouillon, owner of Restaurant Nora and Asia Nora in Washington DC (the first certified organic restaurant in the US). So go ahead and buy more tomatoes and pass on the can of SpaghettiO’s.

Here on Bainbridge Island (off the coast of Seattle where I’m staying for a few more days), it’s actually a challenge not to eat organic foods (much of which is also locally grown). One particular small store and cafe, Island Health Foods, makes a special effort to inform customers of how many miles their produce has traveled on handwritten note cards disclosing that distance beneath the price of each item. I’ve never seen this done before and thought it was very clever.

I continue to be wowed by Island Health Foods as I just went to their website to additionally discover:

“Our café is far along on the way to becoming a zero waste operation. All our to-go containers—yes, even the straws—are 100% recycled, bio-compostable from NatureWorks. We compost all our kitchen waste and to-go containers and are working on a local education program on composting and sustainable waste management.”

There is certainly more chatter these days about such topics, including the cost to the environment, in CO2 emissions, to transport our food from the farm to your local grocery store. Ironically, the day after I noticed Island Health Food’s signs, there was an article in the Seattle Post about 80 Seattle residents eating on the “100 mile diet” for the month of August.

Hang in there Al Gore; momentum is building!

9″ x 12″ watercolor, $90 ($10 donated to LifeLine Pilots)
SOLD
See all artwork available for sale.

My mother has worked as a patient case manager in hospitals for as long as I remember. There have been countless times she has worked with patients navigating tremendously traumatic circumstances bringing them swiftly to a hospital far from home. For many of her patients, time, circumstance and the distance between them and the people and places offering their best chance at wellness might as well be to the other side of the world.

The need for “air ambulances,” in stances such as these, is certainly being met commerically. But should you require such services, you will also certainly pay the price (even articles dating several years back state ballpark figures of $5-10k per airlift). Enter LifeLine Pilots, a nonprofit organization over 500 volunteer pilots strong getting people in medical emergencies from point A to B quickly without item number one on your hospital bill containing three zeros. They also transport patients for organ transplants, treatment/diagnosis, as well as taking family to offer support or for a last goodbye.

My social circle often seems to have a disproportionate number of pilots (who also read this blog), so for those of you who fit the description, consider utilizing your specialized skills as a way to give back, verses volunteering in a capacity nearly any of us are capable of. If you don’t fly, keep this, and similar organizations, in mind should the need arise. The LifeLine Pilots’ website fully outlines their criteria, services, and how to arrange for a flight.

8″ x 10″ oil on canvas, available for sale at Expressions of You Coffee Shop.
See all artwork available for sale.

I’ve always said I love garlic, in abundance, on anything. I may stand corrected, although I’ll have to get back to you on that after I harvest garlic tomorrow and make my own garlic ice cream at The Food Literacy Project’s Family Farm Day. I may also bake bread in a solar oven (weather permitting) and pass the brush onto someone else to have my face painted. From 10-2 tomorrow (Saturday) you can partake in all of this and more at Oxmoor Farm. Proceeds from tickets sales and the silent auction will go towards The Food Literacy Project’s efforts to reconnect consumers (especially kids) with the processes and products of organic farming via hands on learning.

Personally, I believe we are easy targets for junk food manufacturers because it’s been decades since anyone of us understood from experience what food really consists of and how it makes it to our plates (or wrappers). So ignorance is bliss as we eat our cheesy puffs, and “made with real…” in front of any ingredient on a box is luxurious instead of expected. The Food Literacy Project is out to bridge this great divide by meeting urban Louisville residents on their turf since the farm is juxtaposed next to the city’s largest mall and I-64. School groups, adults, or whomever can taste foods from the farm, plant seeds, learn about composting and more (or they’ll come to your school).

Maybe I’ll see you out there tomorrow. You get to try my garlic ice cream first. Ha!

$5/person
$20/family pre-registered
$6 at the door
children under 2 free
To pre-register: Call (502) 413-5989 or email foodliteracyproject@gmail.com

7″ x 9″ watercolor, $70 ($10 donated to Brent Bosse’s recovery)
SOLD
See all artwork available for sale.

After posting about fellow mountain biker, Tina Vogel, and her road to recovery after a terrible accident, I received an email from Erin Hunter of St Louis requesting a similar painting for someone in her life.

Her email delivered a sobering story:

“A very good friend of mine and my family’s, Brent Bosse, was diagnosed with cancer just last week. He is 34 years old, has a wife and two little girls under the age of 6. He went in to see the doctor last week thinking he may have an ulcer and left with the terrible news that he has cancer. They believe it started in his colon but it has spread to his liver, abdomen and lungs. We are putting together an auction in his name to help raise money for his medical bills and/or money to leave his wife (who had leukemia herself) and girls after he passes. The auction/fund raiser for Brent is being held on Saturday, June 30th in East Alton, IL…where we all grew up and where Brent still resides today.”

I’m happy to contribute and wish Brent and his family the best. I can’t image how hard this must be, especially with 2 young daughters. Good thing he obviously has wonderful friends like Erin.

6″ x 6″ watercolor in a 13″ x 13″ frame, $175 ($10 donated to 100 Mile Diet)

See all artwork available for sale.

No, don’t worry, I’m not going to preach about the health benefits of running 100 miles to lose weight (I’m still working on finishing a 5k myself). This diet, unlike Atkins or South Beach, is most likely not on your radar. But first, let me preface the description with a little oration.

The commercial food industry has placed a vast distance between the origin of the food we eat and our plates. The greater that distance and disconnect, the less likely we are to be inquisitive about how corn is turned into Doritos. Since we trust food manufacturers’ production methods, as evidenced by an enormous majority of real estate in a grocery stores being occupied by processed foods, we end up naively believing “enriched ____” is a good thing.

Truth be told, food manufacturers want things this way so money-saving-corners can be cut and physically addictive “tastes” can be engineered in laboratories to make that “home-style” flavor prominent in your boxed dinner via a slew of ingredient you can’t pronounce.

Proactively becoming aware and engaged in reacting to this realization certainly takes time and effort. Although the imperative demand of our attention is inevitable if we hope for optimal health and an ablution of our insides from high-fructose corn syrup and synthetic hormones.

Eating foods separated from you by one minuscule degree, a farmer, is a foreign concept to many. I found a website, 100milediet.org, that takes this concept to the max: exclusively eating foods grown within a 100 mile radius of your home. The website states that,

“When the average North American sits down to eat, each ingredient has typically traveled at least 1,500 miles—call it ‘the SUV diet.’”

Clearly, this also has tremendous environmental implications as well. That’s a high CO2 price tag (not to mention a high $ price tag) to bring your out-of-season berries from down south.

Farmers markets are an excellent way to reestablish what “food” truly means, support local growers, and encourage environmentally sustainable agriculture and business practices. Your kids will also likely develop an interest in what they eat and prefer playing in the dirt from their own mini vegetable garden to digging wash-off tattoos out of frosty-o’s cereal boxes.

Here are some resources to get started:

• The USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service offers a comprehensive PDF list of farmers markets by city and state.
• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: a Year of Food Life

Locally for Louisvillans:

• A list of farmers markets in the city, and throughout the state
• The Food Literacy Project at Oxmoor Farm
• Rainbow Blossom has just announced they will be holding a farmer market at their St Matthews store location on Sundays

6″ x 9″ watercolor, $70 ($10 donated to Tina Vogel’s upcoming benefit)
SOLD
See all artwork available for sale.

If you’re having one of those days that has you feeling sorry for yourself, let me help you snap out of it. Recently, an acquaintance of mine fell out of a two story window in a truly bizarre accident, landed on her neck, and is now in a coma and paralyzed. Tina Vogel is 25 years old, was incredibly active, and now has yet to wake up to face a devastating reality. The details of the story aired on a local TV station, which you can watch by clicking here.

I met Tina through my mountain biking friends and saw her on the trails just a month or two ago. She’s one of the most cheerful people I’ve ever met. I can’t imagine what her family and boyfriend are going through right now. I was running at the park the day after I got the news and thought about how I take even putting one foot in front of the other for granted. It must be especially hard for someone so physically active to adjust to the confinement of a wheelchair.

Luckily, Tina did have health insurance, but it’s not covering everything. As you can imagine, the bills are stacking up, so many of her friends are coordinating benefit events to raise money for her medical expenses. I know there will be a bike ride for Tina soon and possible other events that you can track on the blog her boyfriend has started to document her recovery.

I asked a good of friend of Tina’s to tell me something about her that I could work into a painting. Since she was an avid outdoor athlete, I could have done any number of landscapes. But I decided on these flowers because, apparently, Tina loves pink.

Get well soon Tina!

You’re not going to be a very good advocate or activist if you’re not healthy. I suppose there’s something to a flight attendant’s instruction to first put on your own oxygen mask before helping others.

Here’s a great resource in the health section of the New York Times today that covers some unfortunately common diseases.  I few of the headlines read:

• “How to Halve the Death Rate From Colon Cancer.”
• “How Does Your Waistline Matter? Let Us Count the Ways.”

You can calculate your BMI, or learn how to avoid being one of 6 million Americans who don’t realize they have diabetes.

Deductibles, co-pays, and medical expenses that “don’t count” keep me at arm’s length from the doctor’s office.  Therefore, staying in the know is an important counter balance in maintaining my health.  Even if our medical system doesn’t hinder you, being proactive about your health can make a world of difference.