Salmon Days Festival Spectacle "Recycle - What A Wonderful Whirl!"
Jeroen Mourik, Artist in Residence. |
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Live Performance
Festival
Spectacle - Recycling 
Saturday, October 4th @ 1:45pm,
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Hey, family photographers: If you took some good photos at our performance at Salmon Days and would like to share them on the web, please send them to me (if they are 2 - 3 pix, or drop off a disk) and I'll post what I can. Thanks,
Connie Taylor
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Artist in Residence, Jeroen Mourik, worked with our students and specialists on his Festival Spectacle “Recycle – What a wonderful whirl!” for Salmon Days 2008. Both Seth Miller (Newcastle’s PE teacher) and Robin Wood (Newcastle’s music teacher) are partnered with Jeroen to create this wonderful opportunity for our students. This community outreach program sponsored by Cascade Bank and the Issaquah Arts Commission resulted in a performance on Saturday, October 4th at the Issaquah Salmon Days Festival at 2:00 pm on the Field of Fun, behind City Hall in Issaquah. Besides the students from Newcastle Elementary, members of the Issaquah Special Population Group, The Center for Dance in Preston and Gymnastics East will participate in this event. Although, the time that our students spent working with the “Artist in Residence” at Newcastle Elementary is invaluable, the actual performance in front of an audience at Salmon Days was the ultimate reward for their hard work. Short Synopsis of the production:
Act
One (the garbage’s perspective) Act Two (the ecosystem’s perspective) Nature too, reduces, reuses and recycles. We witness plate tectonics, the water cycle and the food chain in action. Act Three (the planet’s perspective)
Humans have their world in their hands. Will they spin the earth in a
destructive spiral or will they change direction and create a wonderful
whirl? On Friday, October 3rd all students, including those that couldn't make it on Saturday, performed the show in a dress rehearsal at Newcastle Elementary. The performance began around 2:00 pm. Each group was seated in a different ring of the wider circle around the performing arena: first inner circle Kindergarten, next 1st Graders, and the 5th Graders on the outer ring of the circle. We did have rainy weather: But luckily the rain took a break right before we began and only started to drizzle again when the program was over. The show was very enjoyable!
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After the show we received a wonderful letter from Jeroen Mourik address to all of us. Dear Pupils, Teachers and Parents of Newcastle Elementary, What a Wonderful Whirl! I am struggling to express how much I enjoyed working with you all over the last two weeks. It was a pleasure to work with such motivated, talented pupils and have the support of a wonderful team of teachers and parents. Thank you, thank you, thank you! The Festival Spectacle at the Issaquah Salmon Days on Saturday was SUPER, thank you all so much for enduring the weather and giving me and the audience such a wonderful performance! Children, you can be proud of your accomplishments in the last two weeks. Your achievements should not be underestimated: learning a complete 30 minute show during a few classes over a period of two weeks, is something that even trained performers find very hard. Your talent, your creativity and commitment was inspiring. Besides learning to dance so fast, you all stepped up to the challenge to make a wonderful costume out of a boring garbage bag. They were fantastic! I loved them and had some great feedback from the audience on your designs. With sad feelings, I just finished packing my suitcases. In a couple of hours I am flying out to leave State Washington, but sincerely hope to be back next year. Normally this would be the end of my project as Artist in Residence for Issaquah Salmon Days at your school, but thanks to your support to my personal efforts to raise money for the 267 orphans of the Mbiriizi Primary School in Masaka, Uganda, Africa, we are not done yet! I shall travel to Uganda June next year to work as an artist with the 900 pupils of the school and stay in touch with you to report on my work there AND keep you informed what the money you raise for Sylvia’s Children will bring the orphans at Mbiriizi Primary School. Sylvia suggested that you all make a class photo and write a letter about yourself, your pets, your favorite sports, etc. If feel like it, please remember that the children in Uganda are very poor. They have toys made out of recycled materials and do not have computer games or other expensive, luxurious things like TV, etc. So please do not mention these kind of things in your letter. Instead please talk about yourself or how much you enjoyed dancing the Festival Spectacle. After my vacation I shall start a website to enable us to communicate with each other about this special project, meanwhile thank you so much for your efforts to raise funds! Keep up the good work and let’s continue to make a Wonderful Whirl! Love and best wishes, Jeroen Mourik |
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| Here's a link to the Issaquah Salmon Days Festival Page |
At http://www.tigermountainphoto.com you will soon find professional photos made during the Festival Spectacle on Saturday. |
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| To communicate with the Salmon Days Festival about my project at your school, please email Robin Kelley, the director of the Festival (rkelley@salmondays.org) |
To communicate with Silvia Allen about her charity and the children of the Mbiriizi Primary School, please contact Sylvia@sylviaschildren.org. |
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Page updated October 10, 2008 |
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