art exchange #21 Shigan-ken's Konan city & St. Johns, Michigan

What began with pen pals in the mid-1990s has turned into an annual exchange of art involving the elementary schools around the St. Johns district and from Japan growing from the original schools of Kosei to the nearby schools of what until 2005 was the neighboring town of Ishibe. The national government gave incentives for merging towns and consolidating administrative work to save money. The result is a larger number of students and artwork on the Japan side of the exchange.

For the past 6-7 years, or more, the high school students from nextdoor Ovid-Elsie's National Art Honor Society have done much of the installation work at the library in downtown St. Johns. At the end of the month-long display they also help to collect the artwork - the U.S. work to travel over the Japan to join in the exhibit they do during summer vacation in August.


This year's NAHS crew worked quickly with staplers, tape, pushpins and banners to create the colorful exhibition that attracts the attention of people young and old who visit the library,
http://briggspubliclibrary.org