Past: 2014 Fremont Solstice Parade Ensemble Background
background + building the ensemble + parade day + thanks
Artland Farm started as a parade ensemble celebrating Washington-grown food and home-grown art in the 2014 Fremont Solstice Parade. The parade build was great fun and our ensemble was a success. I couldn't have done it without the awesome help my project received and I'm grateful to everyone who lent a hand.
The ensemble grew out of an idea I had in 2012 when I worked for the Ballard Farmers Market. My first day on the job was the day after I had been in the Solstice Parade organized by the Fremont Arts Council (FAC) and I immediately thought that it would be fun to do a farmers market float in the parade.
The seed idea finally sprouted in 2014. One day in January I was planning to post to the FAC yahoo group about my parade idea when I saw a post by FAC member Randy Kilmer looking for a papier mache artist to work with horticulture students at Nathan Hale High School. I contacted him and was hired as an artist-in-residence in the greenhouse to help students design and build large mache vegetables. The students won two blue ribbons at the Northwest Flower and Garden Show, Randy agreed to partner with me for the Solstice parade and the vegetables moved on to a second life in our farm ensemble.
During the parade build I had the idea for and started working on a related project called The Beloved Garden, the ongoing public art project I am growing now.
