Artistic Outreach
In the summer of 1996, artists Michael Townsend, Erica Duthie and Debbie Abramson taught St. Louis children how to get creative with painter’s tape. Sponsored by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, their Carondelet workshops were part of a community outreach program to encourage young children to get involved in the arts.
Over the course of eight weeks, the artists visited the local YMCA and various area schools, including St. Joseph Institute for the Deaf. The program concluded with a multimedia art exhibit of music, dance and sculpture held in the courtyard of the Carondelet Motherhouse.
The Exhibit
The artists, who were inspired by the courtyard at the Motherhouse in St. Louis, held an art show of flowing life-like angels flying high, held up by strings in the courtyard to give the image of them flying.
Along with the flying sculptures, there was a dance performed by the three artists and 15 Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet. Titled Carondelet 13 after the clock in the Motherhouse courtyard, “the performance indicated one step beyond time to show that the Sisters of St. Joseph move beyond themselves and are alert to the needs of the time.”
The art exhibit and community outreach program were also covered by the local paper, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
