This Friday, Art Corps will volunteer to help with a larger than life, reclaimed materials sculpture that is part of a community wide volunteer effort. The vision for this piece came from George Sabra, an internationally recognized, Austin-based sculptor who works exclusively with discarded materials, has had works displayed in the Vatican and was featured in National Geographic Magazine. Art Corps will have the opportunity to work with this artist on the 21 foot high sculpture made from 25,000-30,000 plastic caps, which will be displayed outside at City Hall during Austin’s Green City Festival.
The Art Corps program at American YouthWorks seeks to teach young people the “art of living” by inspiring them to be good stewards of the world around them. This project is a perfect learning opportunity for Art Corps members as they will participate in creating a sculpture designed to increase awareness of the natural environment and inspire people to take action. In addition, by working with a professional artist who started with a vision, created a plan and saw the plan through to fruition, they will gain a greater understanding the process of realizing their own visions of getting a high school diploma, planning for college or getting that perfect, high wage job.
The sculpture will be unveiled at 2:00 PM during the Austin Green City Festival on October 23rd. Many groups are helping with the volunteer effort. You can get involved by coming to the unveiling, helping the artist prepare the caps or collecting plastic caps from peanut butter jars, Gatorade drinks, jelly jars, mayonnaise jars, etc. For more information, see the website for the sculpture.