Gerrie Schipske's Blog: 11/4/12

Artists Still Have Time to Submit Work for Long Beach Winged Wonders Banners Project

Long Beach, CA -- November 7, 2012 – Local artists still have time to enter their renderings of local “Winged Wonders” for the urban bird walk project to be displayed on banners at the El Dorado Park duck pond off Willow Street and Studebaker. The project celebrates the diverse avian wildlife that make their home in the Lakes, Ponds, and Wetlands of the City of Long Beach.

Anyone who has walked around the El Dorado duck pond has seen a myriad of these beautiful winged wonders. Once local artists respond to the call to submit their renderings of the wild birds, you will be able to see their work hanging from light posts to help educate visitors about the feathered treasures in our city. The project, launched by Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske, will include a recorded tour which visitors will be able to access via their cell phones as the walk around the pond area.

“Local artists are being asked to submit artwork depicting 44 wild birds that inhabit the pond,” says Schipske, who established a Lakes, Ponds and Wetlands Task Force five years ago. “Visitors will be able to walk in the beautiful setting of the park while they learn about our different species, their migration habits, habitat, and the importance of these birds to the environment,” Councilwoman Schipske explained.

Schipske notes that she launched the partnership between the art community and supporters of our wild life to help educate and promote awareness about the numerous birds who make their home in our local ponds, “The colorful, creative banners will be accompanied by bird sounds and a narrated tour that can be accessed by visitors’ cell phones.”

The “call to artists” is being coordinated by the Arts Council of Long Beach and the Long Beach Museum of Art and is open to all artists that live or work in Long Beach. There is no age restriction. Submissions of two dimensional artwork are welcome. Art must be a single image in color with no background. Work must be original and done on a flat surface of canvass or paper with each individual artists’ chosen medium. Photographs or three dimensional artwork will not be accepted. Artists are permitted to submit original art of up to three different bird species, and each can be created with a different medium. All submissions will be juried by an independent review panel assembled by the Arts Council. A list of the bird species is available by clicking here: http://www.longbeach.gov/naturecenter/birds.asp.

Deadline for submissions of original artwork is Friday, November 30, 2012. Submissions must be submitted to the following address: http://artscouncilforlongbeach.submittable.com Each artist will need to provide his/her name, artist statement and description of each piece submitted. Up to three images, each depicting a single species, can be submitted with an optional detail shot of each image.

Schipske is partnering with Partners of Park, Los Cerritos Wetlands Trust, Waste Management, and the Port of Long Beach to raise funds for the printing of the banners and a book featuring the artists and their works that will be made available in the El Dorado Nature Center.
For more information, please contact Molly Gardner at the Arts Council: 562 435 2787.