Director's Note 8/1/16
Lots of time outdoors this past month, from Tomeka Reid's evocative concert on the porch of Eliza's cabin, to our free family day, to our planetary picnic (sorry about the clouds). Each day at camp, kids spent hours outside, enjoying our new vegetable garden, building rafts to float across the pond and--when in the studio--watching our chickens hatch and grow. It was also the month when Pokemon Go made itself felt, and many of us spent time shooing out after-hours players when we went to close the gates. The rain garden in the parking lot is covered with groves of bee balm, and each time I walked by I heard the droning and saw the bees hanging from the purple blooms.
Fo Wilson's project, Eliza's Peculiar Cabinet of Curiosities is at the center of much of our programming in August. On August 6, Viktor Le and his collaborators invite you to I Am Brotha' to the Daughter, Keeper of the Dust, a performance that includes a meal prepared by the artists and shared with the audience. A week later, on August 13, Honey Pot Performance adapts their latest production, Ma(s)king Her--an AfroSurrealist dance theater work centered on women of color as empowered future beings--for peripatetic outdoor viewing. Both of these performances are meant to be intimate; tickets are limited and must be purchased in advance (see below for details). On August 19 the Cause Collective--Hank Willis Thomas, Ryan Alexiev, Jim Ricks, and Will Sylvester--brings the Truth Booth to Lynden for one day only. This giant inflatable speech bubble and video recording booth is traveling the world in search of the truth, engaging the public in an interactive experience with art, media, and free speech. Because the project resonates so deeply with Wilson's project, we have invited Sue Pezanoski Browne, our freshly minted Teacher-in-Residence, and Claudia Orjuela, Lynden's graduate fellow--both of whom worked with Wilson during our recent Innovative Educators Institute--to lead informal tours enabling visitors to discover connections between the Truth Booth, Eliza's cabin, and the exhibition in the gallery. Stop in to record a two-minute video completing the statement, "The truth is...." and stay for a tour.
Our fifth annual fundraiser, Harry & Peg Bradley's Backyard Barbecue is very much on the calendar, scheduled for August 25. It is this event that funds our education programs, making them accessible to children from the northwest side to Watertown, from Sheboygan to Racine; it is what allows us to design unique programs connecting Eliza's cabin to the Cause Collective. The barbecue itself is a very low-key, family friendly event, with music, a magician, and art and nature activities and always a wonderful meal prepared by Dave Swanson of Braise. This year, we're offering VIP table service and an option to sponsor an artist (there is now a small legion of artists who have had residencies, or mounted exhibitions, or participated in education programs at Lynden)--also an alternative if you can't attend. We don't ask our friends for a lot, but we do need your support, and with three weeks to go, we'd like to sell this out quickly. Please go online or give us a call and reserve your spot today.
And if you're just looking for a nice place to sit in the sun, artist-in-residence Sara Caron has extended her Coffee Mondays to most of the Mondays in August. She is also designing Wednesday evening hikes that will kick off on August 17 (trail mix included).
