The Ruby Lake Lagoon Nature Reserve Society is bringing the arts into its Iris Griffith Interpretive Centre programs with the help of $15,000 from 2010 Legacies Now - announced this week.
From April to Sept-ember next year, the Lagoon Society, in partnership with the Sunshine Coast Arts Council, will host arts workshops at the centre with Coast artists-in-residence.
"It's a tremendous boost to us," said Lagoon Society chair Michael Jackson.
The society, with the backing of the community, has been building the interpretive centre the past 18 months, Jackson said.
"It's really a nature interpretive centre but we want to promote also a kind of connectedness with the environment and the people so the arts come into that. Bringing together nature and culture is one of the aims of our society," he said.
Six artists will be chosen from the Coast to be artists-in-residence at the centre for one month each. The artists will be involved with workshops and will work with children in the nature school program. Each artist will leave a legacy at the centre by leaving behind one piece of art at the end of the month.
"Art and artists give the opportunity for people to see things in new ways," said Scott Scobbie of the Arts Council. "For people to be looking at our environment in essentially different ways depending on the medium that the artists use will bring different perspectives to the table. So it's really exciting."
Chris Koopmans, chair of the Spirit of BC Community Committee on the Sunshine Coast - a 2010 Legacies Now program - said the interpretive centre will become a focal point of the Coast.
"I think this is just an amazing opportunity for the Sunshine Coast," Koopmans said. "It's quite a vision and I'm happy that we are a part of it."
The Lagoon Society and Arts Council will set up a committee to consider artists' proposals during the selection process over the coming months. In September of this year, they will start preparing for the program's operation. The society will be advertising for proposals and hosting open houses over the coming months.
Through its Arts Now program, the non-profit 2010 Legacies Now is funding organizations in communities throughout the province to increase arts and cultural activities.
"Our aim is to enhance and showcase British Columbia's artistic and cultural community, leading up to 2010 and beyond," 2010 Legacies Now president Marion Lay said in a press release.
For more information, visit www.2010LegaciesNow.com or www.lagoonsociety.com.
