Cook County News Herald

Calling all artists for “Thin Places” Art Show



This year, for Spirit of the Wilderness’s 10th annual art show, our topic will be “Thin Places.” Each year, our committee—Ellen Stubbs, Bonnie Gay Hedstrom, Mila Horak, Maggie Anderson, Greg Mueller, Hannah Laky, and Mary Ellen Ashcroft—offers a topic that focuses on the overlap between creativity and spirituality. We ask artists to ponder the topic and to create art in response to it.

All members of the community, whether they be professional artists, those who would like to create art, or students—are invited to submit work. As those of you who have come to the show in the past will know, the range of art is amazing, including work done under wonder-art teacher Mila Horak’s direction, by students at ISD 166.

If the topic seems mystifying, it comes from an idea common in Europe of Thin Places, which are often abbeys, standing stones, or holy islands, whose history means that the veil between inner/outer, earthly/ spiritual, mundane/magical seems to dissolve.

We’re asking artists living in Cook County to consider these questions: What sight or sound stops you short, gives you goose bumps, or speaks to you of ‘something beyond’? How do you express the mystery of this place or experience?

All kinds of media are welcome.

The show will open on Saturday, March 16 at Johnson Heritage Post with a reception and a presentation by art historian Wayne Rootsa on “Thin Places.”

For questions contact the Johnson Heritage Post at 218-387-2314 or Greg Mueller at 419-575-8753. Work should be dropped off at the Johnson Heritage Post, March 13, 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.. Show opens Saturday, March 16.

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