Take bold risks, LAVA Festival speakers advise students
MIDLAND, Pa., May 28 – Speakers at the annual Lincoln Park Literary and Visual Arts Festival challenged students to innovate and take bold risks without fearing failure.
The LAVA Festival, hosted by Lincoln Park Performing Arts Center May 26-27, featured guest lectures by Carnegie Mellon University Professor of Art Patricia Bellan-Gillan and publisher-authors Carrie and Kevin Kennedy, as well as a reading from his original book of essays by Lincoln Park alumnus Paul Cunningham.
Students participated in hands-on workshops including screen printing with the Andy Warhol Museum, and constructing a temporary art installation in the park behind the school with performance artists Michael McParlane and Laura Miller.
“I had a career where everything that could go wrong did,” keynote speaker Neil McCormick told a studio theater filled with students and members of the community. McCormick is a U.K. rock critic and the author of the bestselling memoir “Killing Bono” which describes his experience struggling to succeed in the Irish rock scene as his classmate Bono skyrockets to super-stardom. His book is being made into a motion picture of the same name.
McCormick advised young musicians to make sure they enjoy the experience of making their music, and worry less about fame. McCormick said his experiences have taught him the concepts of failure and success are subjective, and students should make the best of whatever situation they find themselves in. “By writing this book, I have changed failure into success.”
Artist Elin Lennox, whose work walks the line between the genres of sculpture, painting, and photography, takes everyday objects and uses them to build surreal landscapes which she then photographs. The result is very organic and familiar, yet at the same time fantastic and alien. She said objects and their texture and feelings fascinated her, but that she had to produce many failures before she got to a result that she was proud of.
Lennox offered this challenge to students: “Don’t be afraid to follow a bad idea that fascinates you, because it may lead you to something good.”
[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
