Celebratory collage created for Lotus

Symbols and colors representing world culture decorated “The Power of Pattern,” a backdrop collage recently hung in honor of the 20th anniversary of the Lotus World Music and Arts Festival.

Commemorating one of Bloomington’s major festivals, the Lotus Festival celebratory collage was a collaborative community effort.

Girls Inc., elementary schools, professionals from IU Health and women in recovery at Amethyst House were among the contributors.

“It was really a representation of the community fabric of Bloomington,” said Loraine Martin, outreach director of Lotus Education and Arts Foundation.

The 770 square-foot cloth backdrop is a collage of symbols and colors that flow from panel to panel.

The artwork was a collaborative effort, said LuAnne Holladay, communications coordinator for the Lotus Education and Arts Foundation.

“It was a great community source project,” Martin said.“It was the help of many hands. We had over 450 submissions.”

Martin said symbol submissions were sent in from all across the community.
The backdrop consists of seven canvas panels, each about five feet wide and 22 feet long, Holladay said.

“We are presenting six of the seven in City Hall,” Holladay said. “They are so tall we have to drape them over the highest beams.”

The symbols within the backdrop were meant to represent the diverse and creative atmosphere in the community, which inspires and fuels the Lotus Education and Arts Foundation, Holladay said.

People were asked to send in a version of the lotus flower, she said.

Other symbol requests included an interpretation of a symbol iconic to any culture, either local or foreign.

There are multiple symbols represented on the backdrop, including roosters, bicycles, trees and turtles.

Once accepted, the symbols were printed using a thin vinyl.

The vinyl was made into the shape of the design and glued to blocks of recycled Styrofoam, which gave the designs a tangible form by which they could be applied to the 22-foot strips of canvas.

A thick acrylic paint called gesso was then rolled onto the blocks so they could be pressed onto the final product.

The design team used a room at the Mathers Museum of World Cultures to experiment with the project.

Gail Hale’s home studio was also vital to the creation of the backdrop, Martin said.
Hale supplied the space necessary to make the piece of art, and her husband helped make a table long enough to work on the 22-foot panels, Martin said.

“It was a nine-month process, but totally a great way to celebrate 20 years,” she said.
The final product of this nine-month task may be large, but it is also mobile, Martin said.

“We basically roll up these seven panels and can fit them in a little Subaru,” Martin said. “So it is something we can utilize again and again.”

The Power of Pattern backdrop will be on display from Feb. 7 through 28 in the Showers Building of City Hall.

In addition to the artwork, some of the tools used to make it will be displayed near the backdrop at City Hall.

Following that exhibition, the backdrop will be lowered and exhibited to about 1,500 elementary school students at Binford Elementary School.

It will also likely be used for the Lotus Festival next year, Holladay said.

One of the greatest payoffs for the design team, she said, was the response from those involved in creating the art.

“People could submit an idea, and nine months later they are sitting in the Buskirk-Chumley Theater, and they look up at the backdrop, and they see one of their symbols up there on the stage, behind these incredible musicians from all over the world,” she said.

“They know they were part of making this big work of art.”