Create
‘We just want people to look up’: TheStudio@620 makes a statement with kites
It’s June 20, as in 6-20, and TheStudio@620 is celebrating a birthday today. At exactly 6:20 p.m. (it’s also summer solstice, the longest day of the year).
Because the building (at 620 1st Avenue South) is closed up COVID-tight, executive director Bob Devin Jones is taking the party outside. The “Sweet 16 Celebration” (so named because the community arts space was founded 16 years ago) takes place today in Lassing Park, 14 green acres on the bay at 1402 Beach Drive SE.
Bob Devin Jones
“We’re going to social distance and fly some kites,” Jones says. “We have 150 kite ‘kits,’ made of biodegradable plastic, or you can bring your own kite and join us.”
If you like, you can just hang out and enjoy the view. Or bring a picnic.
Ah, but there’s more. There will be tables set up, where Jones and his colleagues will pass out Sharpies.
“We’re hoping you will write a word on your kite,” Jones explains, “some word of Thanksgiving, or hope, or humanity, or love, or gentleness.
“Because we have chapter and verse how to protest, how to demonstrate, how to have calamity. And we just want people to look up.”
“The World’s Greatest Kiting Event,” which included both indoor and outdoor festivities, was the last major art exhibition brainstormed by Jones’ co-founder David Ellis, who died in 2018. So today’s event is also a tribute to him.
As always, it’s really about community-bridging. “You can bring your own blanket, your own kite, your own bathing costume – wade into the water,” says Jones.
Proper social distancing, he adds, “goes without saying.”
And this: “When you’re at the table constructing your kite, or writing words on it, we will have masks there, if you don’t have one.”
The event will last through 8:20 p.m. Your kite is yours to bring home.
Admission and kites (while they last) are free; donations graciously accepted.
