Over the first 4 months of 2024, 35 volunteers joined us to help with program activities. They dedicated nearly 400 hours to do paper mâché, paint, organize and help with events. Because of their dedication, we were able to provide a greater scope of services and programming to our community and underserved populations. Thank You, Thank You, Thank You to our wonderful Volunteers!

2024 started out with a big win for Life On Art!

We received our first grant from the National Endowment for the Arts under its “Challenge America” grant program. This NEA funding will, in part, support the completion of “Unbound, the Documentary,” a film that reflects the people, community, processes and emotions that went into building Unbound, our award winning large-scale art installation at the California Department of State Hospitals in Napa, CA.

To find out more about how National Endowment for the Arts grants impact individuals and communities, visit www.arts.gov.

We returned to the Journey Academy in Sebastopol to install the 6-foot heart created by students there during our Artistic Activism series of workshops in October of 2023. Approximately 20 students had created the heart depicting their ideas and feelings, and addressing issues they see in their communities. This month saw the heart finally settle into its permanent location in the school’s admissions office, where it is available for public viewing.

We held two days of workshops with 60 incarcerated men at Soledad State Prison. The men brought a wide range of art experience and used multiple modalities to design feathers that will be included in an art exhibition at the Marin County Civic Center this fall. It was an honor for our team to witness these men’s openness and courage in sharing their stories and artistry.

Our collaborators included Jennifer Sheetz and the People’s Commission for Integrity in Criminal Justice, and Dr. Megan McDrew, program director of Exercises in Empathy and professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Life On Art opened its studio on January 25th for a jubilant evening mixer for non-profit organization board members, volunteers and staff. Participants shared ideas and opportunities to get involved in our local community, built connections with other organizations, and considered what’s missing in the arts community in Petaluma and Sonoma County.

Attended by nearly 200 people, the event was hosted by the AQUS Cafe, partially underwritten by the Peaceful World Foundation, and supported by Cool Petaluma, the Blue Zones Project and Life On Art.

This month, we hosted a breakfast for the Arts Alive community member organizations. Forty-seven invitees had the opportunity to share food, drink, ideas and conversation with other members, with the aim to further the connection between arts organizations in Petaluma.

We were joined by a wonderful rotating group of teens during their February mid-winter break from school. In our studio, the teens engaged in discussions about artistic activism, learned about the criminal justice system, and participated as contributing artists on “Visions of Hope,” an in-progress exhibition that will debut at the Marin County Civic Center in August.

Collectively, this group of dedicated teens completed nearly 100 hours of community service by supporting Life On Art, The Transforming Justice Center of Monterey County, and the People’s Commision for Integrity in Criminal Justice.

On Leap Day this year, Life On Art hosted an event aimed at bringing together our community of mental health providers — to mingle and connect with each other in the spirit of professional friendship and well-being.

Facilitated by John Crowley of AQUS Cafe, this event was attended by approximately 70 people, including mental health nurses, marriage and family therapists, substance abuse counselors, school counselors, child welfare workers, occupational therapists, special education teachers and clinical social workers.

On March 27th and 28th we held two wonderful events featuring Playback Theater, a form of improvisational storytelling that is based on deep listening to audience members’ personal stories.

Facilitated by Playback Theater experts for 34 participants, , day one was a workshop in which we learned how Playback Theater takes place. Day two involved performances—someone in the audience tells a moment or story from their life, chooses the actors to play the different roles, and then everyone watches the enactment as stories come to life with artistic shape and nuance.

Learn more about Playback Theater and its nation-wide programs.

The fun, explorative workshop on March 5th at Life On Art's studio hosted 40+ participants, where they learned the tricks of the parade trade and how to create an amazing entry on a budget! Presenters Marie McCusker of the Petaluma Downtown Association, Michael Bug Deakin from Heritage Salvage, Marie Kneemeyer with Recology, Haley Chimienti of Life On Art, and Josh Cardenas and Kirsten Bjore of WonderStump! Art Collective shared their skills and insight on building sustainable, creative parade entries using mediums such as paper mâché, recycled and upcycled materials, and more.

After a successful event showcasing what can be done with sustainable art practices, Life On Art hosted Sequoia Senior Solutions, Cool Petaluma, Heritage Salvage, and Amor Para Todos to help them create paper mache additions for their individual Butter and Egg Days Parade floats

Life on Art offered a free Heartmakers workshop to volunteers as a “thank you” for dedicating their time and creative energies to our many programs over the past year. In the 2-part workshop, volunteers each crafted and painted an 18” paper mâché winged heart to keep for their personal use.

Life On Art was honored to open its studio to the Petaluma River Park Foundation and its event “Poems. Parks. Placemakers. Community Share Back.” This performance event was co-organized by the members of Grapevine Youth Leadership and the Petaluma River Park Foundation. It was an energizing and creative presentation of data collected from the community about how the Petaluma River Park should be designed and built. Congratulations to our friends at the Petaluma River Park Foundation on an innovative and inclusive process of data collection and sharing!

165 artists and creatives gathered on April 11th to mingle, network, and discuss important topics of how to best integrate the arts into our complex world. A big “thank you” to John Crowley of AQUS Cafe for facilitating the networking event. We anticipate great things to come from the connections made.

On April 14th the Life On Art crew helped welcome Blue Zones Project to the Petaluma community. This is a multi-year initiative to help the community "Live better, longer" by creating healthier environments, and aiding the longevity of healthy and happy lifestyles. The kick-off event held at the SRJC Petaluma campus included the Life on Art booth where participants got to paint a feather with their pledge to the world and to add their feather to a collective heart. The artwork will soon be hung in Blue Zone’s new office location on 4th Street in downtown Petaluma. Welcome, Blue Zones, to Petaluma!

Life on Art and WonderStump! Art Collective banded together on April 18th to help assemble the Funky Chicken Arts Alive float for the Butter and Egg Days Parade. More than 20 unicorns, volunteers, and friendly faces showed up to cut cardboard feathers and help build and outfit the 9-foot tall creation.

The Arts Alive community won the Judges Award for "Most Unusually Entertaining or Thematic Entry" at the Butter & Egg Day Parade! Their giant Funky Chicken paraded down the streets of Petaluma surrounded by members of the Arts Alive community, including the wonderful Unicorn Blessing Brigade, Alchemia Artists, WonderStump! Art Collective, and Life On Art winged hearts.

Cool Petaluma used the Life On Art Makerspace to create an awesome Earth Egg for their “Climate Change is No Yolk!” float. It was an amazing display of care for our Mother Earth — and congratulations on a second place award for use of an electric vehicle!

Fifty students from St. Vincent de Paul Church gathered at Life On Art on a Friday as part of their journey to Confirmation. They collectively created a six-foot winged heart as a visual representation of commitment to their faith journey. Every feather depicted an individual’s desire to grow in faith and service to others.

A special heart painting event brought together 40 mobile home residents in the Life On Art studio.The residents of Youngstown and Little Woods mobile homes have been facing rent increases and threats of eviction by their park owners, a situation difficult for many, especially seniors on a fixed income. 

To provide a space of reprieve, Life On Art invited the two mobile home park communities to come and paint paper mâché winged hearts for their personal use. Each painted heart was photographed and printed on postcards, which were made available for sale online and in select Petaluma businesses to help raise money to support the mobile home park residents.

Every third Thursday of the month, we open our studios to “Arts Alive,” a city-wide eclectic art experience sponsored by the Petaluma Downtown Association. Along with other Petaluma organizations, we invite our community to experience our work. 

In May, we held a Spring Artist Market to celebrate local artisans and creativity in our community. In July, we were involved in the Art and Garden Festival Chalk Art Contest, and hosted a demo with Bob Hone to create paper art “gratitude” stars. And in August, we hosted “The Portrait Drawing Machine,” an innovative portrait-making tool that sparked fascination and joy for participants.

Unbound, our nationally and internationally recognized project, was completed in 2022, but keeps on giving.

We continue to hold tours of this large-scale installation in its locked facility at the California Department of State Hospitals in Napa. Community leaders, nonprofit teams, therapists, students, philanthropists, and government and civic leaders have all witnessed the power of this evocative work of art.

“Unbound, the Documentary,” a film that reflects the creation and impact of Unbound, is currently in production; we expect it will be entered into nationwide film festivals when completed. 

When Unbound leaves DSH Napa in November, it will be reinstalled, for the first time for public viewing at Life On Art.

We hosted a Summer Solstice celebration to show how ART is one of the most powerful and overlooked tools to build a better world.

Benjamin Von Wong, a World Economic Forum Cultural Leader, spoke to the power of art to provide a common visual language, bring people together, and accelerate change. Forward Global and Next Legacy supported this event as an amplifier of a diverse community  building relationships that unleash resources, connections, and talents to maximize impact for the greater good. Tracy Ferron, Life On Art’s Founder and Board Chair, helped attendees experience the role of art in bringing communities together in co-creation.

Tracy Ferron took part in the Idea Lounge conversation at the Petaluma Arts Center. Tracy spoke about the power of community art to address our mental health crisis.

The Idea Lounge is a monthly event where speakers share stories that inspire, motivate, and help us reflect. Each month, one speaker is from the arts and the other is not.

In July, we hosted California Forward, a state-wide organization of civic leaders committed to identify solutions to help ensure the economic, environmental and social prosperity of all people. Tracy Ferron shared Life On Art’s goal of creating a new model of participatory public art that includes and elevates underserved and marginalized populations. We are grateful for the partnership of Óscar Chavéz, the President of the Community Foundation Sonoma County, in arranging this powerful event.

This month, we changed our name from Life On Earth Art to Life On Art. 

Life On Art more clearly articulates our mission: Life On Art unites people from diverse communities to co-create handmade large scale interactive art as a platform for social action and healing.

Visions of Hope has been an eight month project that began in January with our first art making workshops in a California state prison. It culminated in an exhibition of the art of the incarcerated at the Marin County Civic Center from September 5—October 24, 2024. 

In June and July, we completed 12 workshops with the incarcerated at state prisons in Soledad and Chowchilla. More than 150 participants designed and painted 18” winged hearts, designed feathers to create two 9-feet hearts, wrote prose and poetry, and recorded themselves in both audio and video. We were joined in this effort by The People’s Commission for Integrity in Criminal Justice and its founder, Jennifer Sheetz. 

Using the artistic output from the incarcerated individuals, we curated and built the exhibition, produced a documentary and mini-documentaries, and published a book of poetry. We developed a robust gallery tour app—all of the incarcerated individuals’ work from the Visions of Hope exhibition can be viewed via a free online app from Bloomberg Philanthropies.

In August, we were joined by Kristin Nelson as Life On Art’s new Executive Director! 

Kristin has already shown our organization a new path into the future—for community outreach, fund development, and program strategies. We are thrilled and excited for this fresh change to Life On Art, not only through Kristin’s unique and experienced perspective, but also her dedication to the impact we bring to our community.

What we’re looking forward to for the rest of 2024:

• Of course, continued support by our volunteers in adding to our inventory of winged hearts, in anticipation of delivering more art workshops to state prisons.

• Bringing Unbound home to our studios and preparing for a public exhibition early in 2025.

• Further monthly “Arts Alive” events, especially for the holiday season.

• Partnering with Home First, an organization that supports individuals experiencing homelessness. We’ll present six artmaking workshops during "Home Is Where The Art Is," their annual program of workshops, art show, reception, and art sale.

• Producing “Unbound, the Documentary.”

• Holding a mini-strategic planning initiative for 2025.

• Finding new homes for some of our large-scale projects—The Spell, Spellbound, and Visions Of Hope.

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