Yesterday's mail contained an envelope of beach sand from New Jersey (sent by a boyhood friend at my request) for
Victor DeGraff to use in a sand painting of
Lucy the Margate Elephant, a national historic monument which stands at the beach in
Margate, NJ. My friend assured me the sand was authentic, and joked he added extra seagull poop for good measure.
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The idea for painting Lucy the Elephant using beach sand was inspired by the sand painting created by Mr. DeGraff of the recently
demolished Stage Company building. What makes the painting unique is the building is
colored by actual brick from the building,
authenticated by the artist and
Mary Jo Hanes, of
The Stage Company and
Sue Mills of
Art Lovers Trading Company.
It took ages to set up a process to fill all the orders we expect to receive, but with the help of
Larry Weatherford (the dean of Southern Illinois sign & design), a way has been found to make prints of Victor's original sand painting on
sand paper! The building in the sand print is also hand-colored with pulverized brick.
A representative of The
Bank of Carbondale has agreed to display the original painting, and take orders for prints. It's a
fun(d)raiser for the Stage Company. One-third of the $120 price will go to the
Stage Company; one-third to
Sands of Time, and one-third to
Art Lovers gallery, which underwrote the project.
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