PUBLIC & COMMUNITY ART

Public art extends the mission to make the arts available to everyone. Crealdé School of Art defines public art as a piece of art that is accessible to the general public at no cost, whose contents are about the community where it is displayed, and which is created by members of the community in collaboration with a professional artist.

Each year Crealdé engages a professional artist in a short-term residency at the Heritage Center, collaborating with community residents to create a permanent piece of public art, providing a focal point for history telling.
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​For more information on public art by Crealdé School of Art and for over 500 other public art works in Orange County, click here.

​Community Pride in Hannibal Square
A collaboration with more than 500 participants

Created in January, 2007
The scenes depicted in ceramic and glass mosaic were designed by schoolchildren after listening to community historian Fairolyn Livingston describe the events of the community’s early history, as well as her own childhood in the neighborhood. Over 500 students, artists and volunteers worked for six months to create this lasting tribute to the proud history and heritage of west Winter Park. Dedicated to the Community February 17, 2007 and produced in partnership with The Golden Rule Foundation, with major funding from The Elizabeth Morse Genius Foundation and additional funding from The City of Winter Park & the Walt Disney World Helping Kids Shine program. The mosaic is xx and xx and is located outside the Winter Park Community Center, adjacent to the Heritage Center.

Lead artist Lynn Tomlinson is the Public Art Coordinator with Crealdé School of Art. She holds M.A. degrees from both the University of Pennsylvania and the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as well as a B.A. in English from Cornell University. Her work, which includes independent films, shorts for Kids’ Public Television, “Sesame Street,” MTV, and commercial clients, has won many awards, among them a Mid-Atlantic Emmy, fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council of the Arts, and most recently a 2006 Florida Division of Cultural Affairs Individual Artist Fellowship for Media Arts. An independent producer and artist in Orlando, in the summers she serves as Visiting Associate Professor in film animation at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Currently, she is a key collaborator on a website featuring Florida folk artists and their communities, (www.Folkvine.org).

Hannibal Square Memory Wall
A collaboration with Mr. Imagination

Created in February, 2008
This artistic collaboration used a traditional form of folk art to memorialize a community. Working with Pennsylvania-based African-American folk artist Mr. Imagination, participants, including former Crealdé artist Lynn Tomlinson, community resident Tom Morton, and area school children and seniors, built this public art sculpture using memorabilia donated from the community.

Mr. Imagination combined the items with his own signature cast elements of hands and angels using concrete to produce the 3'x1'x9' wall sculpture.

The artwork produced by Crealdé School of Art in partnership with the Golden Rule Foundation, with majority funding from Joseph and Lynn Conte.

​Artist Biography: Mr. Imagination, born in 1948, is a native of Chicago, Illinois now living in Pennsylvania. “As a kid, I would cut up old boxes and paint on those, or just use anything I could find. By the time I was a teenager, my room was so full of art I slept under the kitchen table.”

​Once known as Gregory Warmack, he took the name “Mr. Imagination” when he survived a near-fatal shooting in 1978. His brush with death inspired a new awakening in his artwork that expresses his declaration of faith and a sense of pride and dignity in where he came from. His art can be found at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C., the American Museum of American Folk Art in New York, and the House of Blues in both Chicago and Orlando. He was chosen to create a piece for the Coca Cola Olympic salute to Folk Art at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, and was featured in an exhibit at the Terra Museum in Chicago, Illinois in 1993, which the New York Times hailed as one of the most significant shows of the year. He is represented by Carl Hammer Galleries in Chicago, Illinois and Jeanine Taylor Folk Art in Sanford, Florida.

Community Picnic
A collaboration with Artist Ruby C. Williams

Created April, 2007
This art piece is the result of a collaboration between Florida-based artist Ruby Williams (center) and over 50 community members during the April 28, 2007 Grand Opening Celebration of the Hannibal Square Heritage Center. 

A community picnic scene in bold colors with black outlines and descriptive words labeling the food (not always spelled correctly, a Ruby Williams signature), the 4'x8' painting is acrylic on plywood.
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​Artist Biography: ​Ruby C. Williams was born and raised in Beallsville, Florida. She and her family founded a small farming community in Plant City, Florida. Ruby left Florida in the mid 1950s and spent the next thirty years as an upholsterer, minister, and counselor of children. When she returned to the farm, she started making signs to promote her small roadside produce stand, and shortly started producing the sign-like works of art which support her and her family today. Ruby is represented in Orange County by Jeanine Taylor Folk Art in Sanford, Florida.