Seed Journeys Session 2
Welsh Soldiers Wearing Leeks and the Irish Potato from Feast to Famine to Sustainability
Saturday, June 8, 2024
10:30am to 4pm – Drop-in-at-will
Free with museum admission:
$5 Adults; $3 Seniors
Free for Quarry Workers & Children under 12
Slate Valley Museum, 17 Water Street, Granville, New York
Tel. 518-642-1417
The Slate Valley Museum in Granville, NY invites people of all ages to drop in for coffee, conversation and a creative experience at their monthly Seed Journey Sessions with 2024 Artist-in-Residence Serena Kovalosky.
Visitors will co-create a community art installation by stringing dried fruits and vegetables with historical links to Slate Valley immigrants from the 1840s to the present. The sessions are free with museum admission and open to everyone. No art experience is necessary.
The June session of the Seed Journeys series, Welsh Soldiers Wearing Leeks and The Irish Potato from Feast to Famine to Sustainability, will take place on Saturday, June 8 from 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Drop in anytime, stay as long as you want. BYO lunch if you wish. Tea & coffee will be available throughout the day.
Serena Kovalosky will share stories on how the leek became the national symbol of Wales and why Welsh soldiers might have worn leeks on their helmets in battle. She will also share how Ireland’s deep and tragic relationship with the potato became a testament to survival while offering instruction on stringing dried leeks and potatoes on beading wire for the installation.
The Slate Valley is renowned for its variety of colored slate quarried in the region. Participants will be invited to string tiny glass seed beads in the colors of Slate Valley slate as an additional component to the installation.
Young children and those who wish to work on a smaller project with larger beads will have the option to create Friendship Bracelets in the Slate Valley slate colors.
Complimentary tea and coffee will be available throughout the day. The harmonious balance of the museum’s slate interior provides a relaxing atmosphere for visitors as they step away from the world and contribute to this creative community project which will become part of the museum’s permanent collection.
The “Seed Journeys” installation is part of Serena Kovalosky’s residency project, “Moving Mountains: The Mustard Seed Project,” a meticulous, six-month journey of placing tiny mustard seeds from around the world, one by one, on the branches of a foraged mustard “tree” as a contemplative exercise that explores the symbolism of the mustard seed for restoring faith in our ability as individuals and communities to achieve humanity’s dream of peaceful coexistence, one small step (seed) at a time.
Kovalosky’s mustard “tree” sculpture and the community-created “Seed Journeys” installation will be exhibited at the museum’s Slate Valley Holiday Festival on December 6 and throughout the month of December. The 2024 theme is “Peace on Earth.”
Serena Kovalosky is a 2024 recipient of a Community Arts, Individual Artist grant for “Moving Mountains: The Mustard Seed Project.” This project is made possible with funds from the Statewide Community Regrant Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, administered by the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council.
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