BELOW IS ESSENTIALLY A PRESS RELEASE FROM LAURA FOX, which is both self-explanatory and marvelous

March 31, 2005

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

My name is Laura Fox, and I am a sophomore at Sultan High School as well as a Girl Scout in Troop 3037.  I am working on my Gold Award, the highest award in Scouting.  For this project, I have selected an event that I hope will help change the way people think about the future.  I want to inspire our community to dream big!

Many of us are excited about the Sultan Centennial Celebration and its busy calendar of wonderful community events.  For six full months we are all learning about and honoring our past.  As the finale approaches, the final chapter of our celebration will be to close the book on the past and turn toward the future.  In partnership with the Centennial Committee and Sultan Arts Council, I am organizing a special opportunity for citizens of all ages to share their vision for the future of Sultan through the medium of art. 

We are hosting an Art Fair celebrating "The Next 100 Years in Sultan" to coincide with the community picnic on June 25.

We are soliciting entries in a variety of categories—Visual Arts such as oil paintings, watercolors, sculptures, and charcoal sketches; Fabric Arts such as quilting and other sewing projects; Dramatic Arts such as original songs, videos, or dramatic interpretations; and Written Arts such as essays or poetry.  These would depict what Sultan could be like 100 years from now, in 2105.  For example, do people see Sultan as a transportation hub with hourly train service to Seattle?  Do they view it as a Mecca for fishermen, complete with lodges and parks along the river for sporting vacations?  Do people envision a performing arts center that draws talent from around the world or hosts meetings about clean air and water?  Do they live in high rise condominiums, or log homes, or underground "earth homes", or all of the above?  Is there a huge farmers' market for locally grown produce?  Are the trees taller, thicker, and healthier, or are they completely gone?  Is there an airport, a "hover-craft port", a biotech hospital with widespread fiber-optic links to everyone's house?  Are there 30 small schools located in neighborhoods, or a single large Education Complex, or something in between?  Do we have a booming downtown financial district?  When we're all celebrating the 2105 bicentennial anniversary of the city—with our custom engineered replacement hearts and other tissues—what do we want to look around and see in our beautiful valley?

Why art?  Because humans don't accomplish great things just by planning—they first have to dream.  After all, Martin Luther King didn't say, "I have a plan."  It is often the artists and dreamers among us who come first with new ideas, long before the scientists, designers, and other implementers. 

As people relate to what artists depict, they start to buy into a dream and add their own thoughts to it.    Prizes will be offered to encourage and honor entrants, but the real fun is in dreaming.

We ask anyone who is interested in preparing an artistic entry to please fill out an entry form—available from me directly, or at the Sultan Public Library.  Entry forms are due May 10, and the art itself is due on June 3. 

The Sultan Arts Council will soon help choose judges for the Art Fair, and we hope to display winning art somewhere in town following the event.

I believe that each one of us plays a role in helping to make Sultan become what we all dream it can be, so I believe that especially encouraging our friends to write, draw, sculpt, sew, or otherwise participate would be great.  I really hope you will consider entering!  Please call me at 360-793-0737 or email me at marsgirl0737@hotmail.com regarding any questions. 

Or my mom, Katherine Rowe, can also answer questions at cedarpon@premier1.net.

Sincerely,

Laura Fox

Senior Girl Scout and Class of 2007