Strawberries were great when we beat the birds to them!
Partial view of the garden
More pretty plants
It’s so important to me to make art that has an impact, in this case a direct one, on the community in which you live. I appreciate art whose impact is as simple as making someone who wouldn’t usually go out of their way to look at a painting take pause when they see what you made, or as complex as creating social interaction between groups who usually avoid one another. In the case of the One Mile Garden, the Coleman Center’s community garden, it’s about creating something beautiful that is constantly being tended to by community members, and about the collaboration that is inherent in such a process.
Strangers who walk past the garden when I am there always comment, and seem excited that such a place exists in York, where many buildings are caving in and often property is not well-cared for. Even those who are not avid plant and garden-lovers are interested and affected by what they see. I love that when such a beatiful space is created, people admire AND interact if they so choose. If art is about aesthetics, the garden certainly has an aesthetic appeal, a color palatte, and visual structure. If art is about changing and enriching lives, then the garden does that as well.
The artists are Bob Bingham, Robin Hewlett, and Ally Reeves. More on the project can be found here: http://colemanarts.org/2005/artists_OMG.php
