Be A #RiverWitness!

This year, due to the pandemic, the Connecticut River Conservancy’s
Source to Sea Cleanup will take place throughout the month of September. Being a #RiverWitness can help support the Cleanup!

 

photoshop image created by Jane Beatrice Wegscheider

 

#RiverWitness is a way to protect and connect with our rivers.

 

 

#RiverWitness brings us together in taking action for and showing appreciation of our rivers, despite the need to be socially distant this year.

 

#RiverWitness art created by Hazel, age 8

 

You can use the #RiverWitness hashtag on social media to share your creativity inspired by the rivers you care about. What are you seeing in and along your rivers? How does it make you feel?

 

Photo and haiku by Jane Beatrice Wegscheider

 

Post your river photos, stories, artwork, poems and videos 
and tag the Connecticut River Conservancy
to help support their work advocating for our rivers.

 

#RiverWitness illustration created by Micah Goldstein

 

You can also use the #RiverWitness hashtag when you post on social media about helping to clean up trash in and along our rivers:

 

Photo and Tweet by Samantha Wood

 

“This is some people seen from above taking trash out of the river so the fish swimming in the river will have a cleaner place to live.”           — Emma, age 7

 

 

#RiverWitness posts will be shared by the Connecticut River Conservancy to a wider river community. Select images will be used to call on decision-makers to enact trash solutions to keep trash out of our rivers. Posted images will also be used to create a digital mosaic.

For more information and to find out how to get started,
visit the CRC’s website!

And check out their Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

 

 

If you are not on social media, you can share your #RiverWitness images through the CRC’s #RiverWitness webpage.
Scroll down to the bottom of their page to upload your images.

 

 

You can also sign up here to participate in the Source to Sea Cleanup.

 

 

#RiverWitness is a Collaborative Community Art Response Team (CCART) project developed by The Art Garden’s Laura Iveson and Jane Wegscheider and Greenfield artist Samantha Wood in collaboration with the Connecticut River Conservancy.
CCART is supported by a grant awarded by The Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts with funding from the Barr Foundation.

 

 

 

 

 

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How can we respond to community needs with ART?

 

Thanks to a ValleyCreates Planning Grant from the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, The Art Garden has been developing a new initiative, a Collaborative Community Art Response Team (CcART)!

Laura Iveson and Jane Beatrice Wegscheider from The Art Garden have been collaborating with Greenfield artist and organizer Samantha Wood, artist-activist and facilitator Phyllis Labanowski, and Phoebe Walker (Director of Community Services at the Franklin Regional Council of Governments) to design the framework for CcART, which we hope to launch in 2020.

In many ways, CcART is a continuation and expansion of the work The Art Garden has been committed to since its founding ten years ago. We believe that community art-making processes and projects can support individuals and our communities. We also believe that art made in response to community issues can bring about change. Using creative, community art strategies we hope that our Collaborative Community Art Response Team will engage community members, artists and service-providing agencies to help address some of Franklin County’s community needs.

We invite you to share your thoughts with us at one of two upcoming, facilitated listening sessions listed above. Light fare will be provided, so please RSVP!

Thank you!

 

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