DAVIS – A Tucker County Art Group, namely ArtSpring, has come up with a creative way to wish strangers in this world well. The “living art” project reaches out to residents of another community via anonymous letters sent en-masse to a small town openly voted on by the group.
The group says that the project is born out a wish to remind people that though this world is a startling large place full of people we will never meet, that most people, in general, wish you well.
Many people can fondly recall having a pen-pal during their school years or perhaps you wrote to a soldier you never met. This project is similar to that and was the inspiration of ArtSpring member Seth Pitt and is facilitated by an AmeriCorps volunteer Audrey Stefenson. Pitt, who used to randomly send kindness letters on his own to complete strangers, said he realized that it would be a lot better if a whole community came together and sent it to another community.
Pitt knew that a good way for this to happen was through ArtSpring, a group he describes as a community of artists that get together to foster creative events. The group is public and non-exclusionary.
“I thought it would be cool for one community to take time out of their day to wish another community well,” said Pitt.
The Wish You Well project kicked off last year when a group of 30-40 people turned out one night and created letters for a town of about 450. Last year’s chosen town was Cerrillos, New Mexico. The participants created letters and included perhaps some original artwork, or favorite quotes, or inspiring stories. All the letters were sent out using a pen-name and for the safety of the senders any responses received back from the letters were directed to the ArtSpring’s post office box in Thomas. The group was amazed by the outpouring of kind wishes directed back to the participants, with a couple of them still corresponding on a regular basis. One two-page letter in particular said that they had all but lost their faith in good in the world before receiving the letter. The receiving town has also created a FaceBook site where residents can go and share their letter and talk about any message they received. The Cerrillos residents have even mentioned carrying on the same or a similar good-will project of their own.
The candidate towns are chosen randomly and then voted on. This year’s chosen town is Hillsboro, West Virginia. One of the reasons the town was chosen by some was due to an incident which happened there involving some nasty racial slurs spray-painted in two foot letters on the side of a local business. Many members of the community were rallying around the business owners and had started a project of public signs promoting unity in the town. This struck a chord with many of the participants and they wanted their letters of wishing you well to send a message of kindness and good-will to that community.
The participants come together or work on their own at home and create little pieces of art as simple or as complicated as they choose and include messages again as simple or complicated as they choose to be included. They then have the option to take their piece(s) and have it scan to be included in a group collage for ArtSpring to keep as a momento. Each participant includes a preprinted note telling about the Wish You Well project and letting the recipients know how to reach ArtSpring. Participants are then asked to stamp and address their envelope to: Fellow Human Being (and then the provided address).
Pitt said that they’d love to have more community members involved and perhaps children too. He added that they’d love to find a way for it to be an ongoing project and they like the idea of collaborating with another community to cover a larger town.
With the 707 boxes they hope to fill this time the group has set up four separate get-togethers. The first one was at Tip Top Café last week and was attended by around 15 people young and older alike. The group would love to have more attendees at the next work session, or to have people agree to a number to work on at home.
So if you are of an artistic bend and would like to participate in wishing well a fellow human being that you’ll probably never meet, you can find more information at: artspringwv@gmail.com attention Audrey Stefenson.