Director's Note 2/1/18
It’s hard to gauge the impact of the weather roller coaster, the rise and fall of the temperature from day to day, on human behavior, but for the wildlife here at Lynden, the search for food continues. From the Cooper’s hawk perched atop The Bremen Town Musicians, eyeing the birds and squirrels gathered around the Project FeederWatch feeders, to the coyotes loping across the frozen lake, large enough to cause momentary confusion (Is that a dog?), we see animals on the hunt every day.
Certainly the unseasonably warm weather last Saturday brought plenty of people of all ages out for our Winter Carnival, which felt a little bit like a spring carnival. Basha Harris and Ethan Kastner of Yours Truly mobilized many of their fellow-artists to provide a day’s worth of activities at Lynden, and the crew from Davey Tree took to the tall elms for a climbing demonstration. You can check out some pictures on our Facebook page. The winter session has often been a busy one for workshops at Lynden, signaling, perhaps, a desire to avoid cabin fever. Several of this month’s workshops have already filled up, but we’ve added some new sessions to accommodate those who were turned away. Claire Hitchcock Tilton will lead you through the process of planning your vegetable garden for continuous harvest on February 10. (And don’t forget Cary Suneja’s bookbinding workshop in March, where you can make your own gardening journal.) David Moss has added another Legacy Lights workshop in April. There is still space in a new jewelry workshop with Leslie Perrino (February 11); join her to learn how to fuse silver wire loops to make earrings. It’s a great opportunity to improve your hand torch skills.
Jumping ahead to summer, we have posted our summer camp schedule online. Registrations are coming in, and any camp with a “p” in its title seems to be filling up fast. I know it can be hard to think about this when the frogs and turtles are deep beneath the ice, but register now to avoid disappointment.
Last calls this month: our current exhibition of small sculptures by artists in the Bradley Family Foundation collection comes to an end on February 18, and we have an all-ages drop-on workshop on February 11 in which you can make your own version of Tony Smith’s Wandering Rocks using the polyhedral nets illustrated in a series of five posters in the gallery. You have until February 16 to drop off your no-longer-wanted jewelry for Radical Jewelry Makeover, a traveling community mining and recycling project of Ethical Metalsmiths that uses donated jewelry to create an alternative to mining and manufactured jewelry
Katheryn Corbin opens Migrant, her exhibition of nearly-life-sized figurative ceramic sculptures and sawdust-fired vessels made during a residency at Lynden, on February 25. The opening reception (3-5 pm) is free, and a good time to see the work, catch up with friends, and eat a little cheese. Although our next Women’s Speaker Series event is just over the border in March, we wanted to remind you to get your tickets to hear Newbery Medalist Kelly Barnhill read from her new collection of stories, Dreadful Young Ladies.
