Beachside art exhibit shares message of renewal, hope for rebuilding community

As the Beach Art Center continues to wait for hurricane-related repairs, a new exhibition, "The Art of Renewal", looks to embrace the situation.

INDIAN ROCKS BEACH, Fla. - As the Beach Art Center continues to wait for hurricane-related repairs, a new exhibition, "The Art of Renewal", looks to embrace the situation.

What they're saying:

"We still don't have our walls. We're missing a lot of things," Beach Art Center President Jeni Bond said. "The prompt of the show is, we're hoping in the next couple of months that we will be having builders and contractors here, and we're going to be rebuilding."

The Beach Art Center in Indian Rocks Beach is still waiting for hurricane-related repairs.

In January, the center decided to open its doors for the first time since the hurricanes with the exhibition "Rising from the Hurricanes." The local art community responded by contributing to the largest exhibition in the center’s history.

"Look at all the people that showed up," artist James Rivoli said. "It was pretty inspiring. I think every community needs to have art."

Rivoli contributed two pieces to the new exhibit. One features his trademark work of realistic cars with a beach background. The other is a painting of the historic sugar mill in Crystal River.

"The Art of Renewal" exhibit is on display at the Beach Art Center in Indian Rocks Beach.

"This thing has been through how many hurricanes," Rivoli said. "I thought that that was kind of a resurgence message."

Bond says the center is running at about 50% right now. They are hosting classes at different locations, and they plan to host their annual summer camps. Right now, the center’s main building is only being used for exhibitions. Bond hopes with the arrival of spring, more visitors will return to Indian Rocks Beach.

"The Art of Renewal" exhibit is on display at the Beach Art Center in Indian Rocks Beach.

"March and April really start to kick off the activities here," Bond said. "We're open, and there's just a lot of amazing art, because we don't want to focus on the storm anymore. We want to focus on the rebuilding and the renew."

Artist Barbara Parker wanted to be a part of that message, contributing two pieces. One is a post-storm beach scene, and the other features a butterfly surrounded by ferns.

"The Art of Renewal" exhibit is on display at the Beach Art Center in Indian Rocks Beach.

"When I did the background, the canvas for this, it showed me, spoke to me of ferns and growth and greenery. That's when I put the butterfly in on the milkweed, and I selected the butterfly because the chrysalis of the butterfly and the transformation is what spoke to me with this piece," Parker said.

"The Art of Renewal" surpassed the record set by the previous exhibit. It will be on display for the next three weekends, with an opening reception set for Saturday at 5 p.m.

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The Source: Information for this story was gathered by FOX 13 photojournalist Barry Wong.

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