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Ms. Scrappy has an art attack!Josie Winship is organizing something called “Scavenger Birds of Hope” on 24th and 25th Streets between 30th and 31st Avenues. I'm not entirely sure when this event is supposed to take place and I don't know what Winship looks like, so I just ask people, “Do you know Josie Winship?” I go through an alley, turn a corner, and there is someone dressed in paper. “I'm looking for Josie Winship,” I say. “That's me,”says the paper person. “That's Josie,” say the other people in her back yard. Winship is dressed as “Ms. Scrappy” a costume she created out of strips of newspaper. Winship is hoping people will want to stop by and make some art. She and Ann Sugnet were awarded a grant from the Seward Arts and Culture Network for this project. She has clothes and fabric, paint, scissors, glue, wire. A small boy is intent on his project a stretch of fabric decorated with cardboard, more fabric, glitter, and a small plastic mouse. He instructs Ann precisely how to write his name and explains patiently that what he made is a forest with caves and pine trees and branches and leopards and a monster. People walk down the alley, stop, and watch. More sunlight flickers through the trees and onto the clothes line, were other projects are hanging a T-shirt with two cardboard cones affixed to the front, like something Madonna would wear, and another T-shirt that says, “Go Art.” Winship decides to round up some more people and chooses one of the T-shirts to take with her. It's painted “Love is All Around” and stiffened with starch so that she can wave it when she walks, like a flag. She gets a lot of attention as she stops at garage sales, scavenging for free stuff and inviting people to the event. “We're going to give everybody a dollar to spend at the sales,” she explains, “and then we'll make sculptures out of what they find.” Someone gives Winship a basket. Other people donate tin boxes, brightly?colored plastic containers, marbles, a 2000 calendar. Other people driving by stop, honk and wave. “Hello, Minnesotans,” says Winship. “Do you want to make some art?” This is the first year the Seward Arts and Culture Network and the Seward Neighborhood Group offered grants for interactive art pieces to accompany the annual neighborhood garage sale event. —Reprinted from Seward Profile |