Haines City Spreads its WINGS through Interactive Public Art
HAINES CITY, FL – In the Florida based “City of Angels,” Haines City, a unique art experience is taking place. The Community Redevelopment Agency (CRA) launched a citywide arts initiative, Haines City WINGS, to engage residents and visitors in the selfie-crazed world.
This mural project, Haines City WINGS, is a community arts engagement program organized to breathe vitality and new life into neighborhoods and districts designated as CRA responsibility. It is the primary mission of the Haines City CRA to eliminate slum and blight by restoring and beautifying essential regions within the City. The inclusion of the arts provides a tool to encourage business-resident connectivity, supports diversity, and unifies the City.
In cities throughout the nation and the world, the arts are used to bring people together and create a vibe to identify the community’s history, heritage, and hope for the future. This process is inclusive of live music, visual art, bike culture, theater, wellness, and countless other art forms. While this exciting project is only the beginning, Haines City is in the process of doing precisely that – creating a celebratory vibe to the uniqueness of the community.
The project started as an eight-mural arts experience, painting vibrancy, and enrichment into pockets of the community in high-traffic areas and on walls tucked away neighborhoods in need of refreshing and beautification. As the murals have gone up across the City, excitement and questions have flown into the offices of the CRA and have captured the attention of the originator of “The Global Angel Wings Project,” Artist Colette Miller, from Los Angeles, California.
“Through this project, we hope residents and guests visiting the community can connect with the heartbeat of Haines City,” said Deric C Feacher, City Manager. “Having a globally recognized artist, like Colette Miller, contribute to our arts efforts, is unprecedented.”
Miller plans to visit the growing Polk County community of Haines City and share her support by painting an original mural for her Global Angel Wings Project on Mar 7 – 9, 2019. An unveiling celebration and artists’ reception will be March 8 from 6 PM – 9 PM at Lake Eva Park in Haines City.
Featured Artist:
Artist Colette Miller created the Global Angel Wings Project in 2012, in the streets of Los Angeles, the City of Angels. They were painted to remind humanity that we are the angels of this earth. They are human-sized interactive public art, wings that people take photos with and thus become part of the artwork. The first pair was just street art, but the response was natural, immediate, and spontaneous – from people of all sorts and backgrounds. Colette has painted wings globally in Kenya, Australia, England, Japan, France, Cuba, Juarez Mexico, China and more, and many in the United States of America. Though some commissioned and others gifted, the wings themselves are free to the world. Never owned by anyone, not even Colette, though they are her provenance and her work. www.colettemiller.com
Participating Artists:
Artist, Melissa Hale (LOVE LETTER TATTOOS, Pennsylvania): “RISE,” ANGEL WINGS; Lake Eva Park
Artist, Elizabeth Irving (Haines City): “FLIGHT,” BUTTERFLY WINGS; Interior Expressions, 801 Ingraham Avenue – Historic Downtown (Building Owner, Janey Hall)
Artist, AJ Greene (Winter Haven): “LADY JUSTICE” WINGS; 131 North 6th Street – Historic Downtown (Building Owner, Attorney Markeishia Smith)
Artist, Katrina FacePaint (Orlando): “SPIRIT” WINGS; Haines City Boys & Girls Club 704 Avenue C – Oakland Community (City Owned Facility)
Artist, Enos Torres (Haines City): “VICTORY” WINGS; Oakland Neighborhood Center at 915 Avenue E (City Owned Facility)
Artist, Patricia Miller (Frostproof): “BEAUTIFULLY AWARE” BUTTERFLY WINGS; Haines City Chamber of Commerce at 35610 US Hwy 27, South (City Owned Facility)
Artist, Carol Hughes (Lakeland): “WHISPER,” ANGEL WINGS; 801 Main Street – Historic Downtown (Building Owner, Lucy Alvarado)
