PRESS RELEASE
WHAT: Outdoor Memory Sculpture
WHO: Internationally renowned and Smithsonian Folk Artist, Mr. Imagination a/k/a Gregory Warmack, well known for his outdoor installations at theHouse of Blues, Downtown Disney, Chicago and Las Vegas, will design and supervise this community project. Mr. Imagination’s work is highly collected throughout the world and appears in many museums and private collections. Individuals such as Muhammed Ali and B.B. King collect his work. Mr. Imagination has designed an Absolute Vodka ad and was commissioned by Coca-Cola to create a piece for the 1996 Olympics. Mr. Imagination is one of the foremost visionary artists in the world.
WHY: In early folk tradition, memory jugs were created by pressing momentos and family treasures into soft clay jugs. These vessels were passed down from generation to generation. Much in the same fashion, the Sanford community will have the opportunity to preserve their community and family memories by participating in this tradition and artistic endeavor by pressing family momentos such as buttons, coins, colored glass, jewelry and stones into an outdoor sculpture.
WHERE: Gallery on First and Jeanine Taylor Folk Art located at 211 E. First Street, Historic Downtown Sanford, FL 32771
WHEN: Saturday, July 28, 2007, at 10:00 a.m., Mayor Linda Kuhn will inaugurate the project by installing the first momento, followed by artists and community members. Sunday, July 29, 2007, through Saturday, August 4, 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., the general public is invited to come meet Mr. Imagination and bring their treasures to add to this important community project.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND: General Public
COST: Free
CONTACT: Robin Marks, Mosaic Station, 407.323.3555; in conjunction with Creative Sanford, Inc., Developer of Celery Soup, a Community Folk Life Performance, debuting in 2008.
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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
For more than twenty-five years, Gregory Warmack, also known as Mr. Imagination, has been transforming discarded, recyclable objects into works of art. Mr. Imagination is a self-taught, visionary artist who, until a recent move to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, lived and worked in Chicago. Mr. Imagination’s fanciful sculptures include works carved from the sandstone created as a by-product in the steel industry as well as found objects like bottle caps, discarded paintbrushes and other refuse. “Mr. I” is well known for the workshops that he leads for children and adults in which he teaches participants to create their own art from found materials.
As a child growing up in Chicago’s south side, Warmack developed a love for painting and design. His first art show was in a neighborhood park where he displayed pictures painted on cardboard by him and other local children. Warmack himself offered free after-school art lessons to neighborhood kids to prepare them for the show. As a young man, Warmack went on to design jewelry, which he sold to customers in the bards and businesses of south-side Chicago.
It was during one of these sales calls that Warmack was mugged, shot and left for dead. After lying in a coma for a month and a half, Warmack emerged a changed person. During his unconsciousness the artist describes a spiritual voyage in which “there was a bright tunnel that I went through that was brighter than the sun.” This experience left an indelible impression on his life and work.
About a year after his recovery in the early 1980s, Warmack began using the moniker of Mr. Imagination. At this time he dedicated his life to art-making and made a commitment to working with children and communities. His work has been shown in museums such as the Terra Museum in Chicago and the American Folk Art Museum in New York and in Baltimore’s American Visionary Art Museum. He has created public art displays, including a bottle-cap-covered cow for Chicago’s public presentation and several “grotto” projects in Chicago, Orlando, Winston-Salem and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Theses “grottoes” or outdoor-embedded concrete sculptures are community projects in which the local population contributes to the piece as well.
SUGGESTED MOMENTOES: Buttons, seashells, costume jewelry, glass shards, bottle-caps, watches, hardware, tools, beads, coins, scissors, etc.
Students from the University of Central Florida Film and Digital Media School will be documenting this project.
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