Lisa Tiemann Studio news

2010-09-24T15:01:00.008-04:00

Look for my stained glass windows at Hugo's in Melrose
Two macaw panels will be on display as part of the Melrose Artwalk on Main Street, Melrose, MA, for two weeks beginning in mid-October. I called this five-macaw diptych "Parrot Conversation" long before I went to the Brazilian rainforest and learned how loud five of them in the wild could actually be. Amazing!

MAAV joins Lisa Tiemann Studio this fall Several middle school students and adults from the Melrose Alliance Against Violence have been working in the studio creating some mosaic stepping stones out of concrete pavers and stained glass. We have beautiful results thus far--visit the blog after November and a photo of the final results will be posted.

Summer's Free Mosaic Workshop at Lisa Tiemann Studio went beautifully. This workshop was thanks to a grant from the Melrose Cultural Council and was attended by twelve people. View the results of just six hours of work at the top of this posting.

TURTLE DAY WAS A BIG HIT

2010-08-07T12:23:00.002-04:00

How beautiful to see hundreds of families enjoying the beauty of Ell Pond on Turtle Day, June 26th, 2010. It was a turtle be-in, with storytelling, face painting, and of course the turtles themselves were the stars.
Here are some of the articles that preceded the event:

http://melrose.patch.com/articles/a-celebration-of-all-things-turtle-at-ell-pond-saturday

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/melrose/2010/06/in_melrose_saturday_is_turtle.html

http://www.wickedlocal.com/melrose/news/business/x383301792/Melrose-Girl-Scouts-hold-Turtle-Day-at-Ell-Pond

Lisa Tiemann Studio news: TURTLE DAY IS SATURDAY, JUNE 26th!

2010-05-31T16:19:00.001-04:00

Lisa Tiemann Studio news: TURTLE DAY AT ELL POND, MELROSE IS SATURDAY, JUNE 26th!: "Links to this post"

TURTLE DAY IS SATURDAY, JUNE 26th!

2010-05-31T16:06:00.003-04:00

The girl scouts will be honoring the turtles of Ell Pond on Saturday, June 26th. Please come and bring your family--it should be great fun. I'm very proud that this event sprang from the creation and installation last June of the Turtle Stepping Stones at Ell Pond. So they're celebrating turtles AND art. And of course the nature that surrounds and sustains us all. Good going!
VISIT: http://www.turtleday.homestead.com/

Melrose Arts Festival April 17-18

2010-04-13T20:25:00.001-04:00

I'm exhibiting my work at the Melrose Arts Festival this weekend. Please come by!
http://www.melrosearts.com/artsfestival2010.html

NEW DATE for Stained Glass Class

2010-01-30T17:32:00.001-05:00

STONE SOUP OASIS: STUDIO WORKSPACE OPENS

2009-12-27T12:34:00.004-05:00

2009-11-27T15:41:00.002-05:00

SAVE the DATE: Saturday, June 26th, 2010

TURTLE DAY AT ELL POND
The turtle stepping stones installed last June have inspired the Girl Scouts to create a day-long event celebrating the denizens of our favorite pond . There will be a mosaic table for young crafters, turtle storytelling, turtle educators bringing real turtles, and other events.
Elementary school kids should bring their parents.
Rain date: Sunday, June 27th
Look for further details soon.

2009-07-08T14:00:00.000-04:00

Lisa Tiemann at Ell Pond with one of the turtle stepping stones
Photo by Nicole Goodhue Boyd and article posted with permission of the
Melrose Free Press

Melrose Free Press article, June 18, 2009

2009-07-08T13:52:00.000-04:00

Melrose's Ell Pond gets culture, horticulture

By Daniel DeMaina / ddemaina@cnc.com

Melrose - Last Saturday, Melrose’s most famous body of water got a little makeover.

Volunteers and members of the Ell Pond Improvement Council spent the morning readying two holes for local artist Lisa Tiemann’s mosiac stepping-stones, which will serve as footrests for residents sitting on the two stone benches overlooking the pond from the Knoll.

Tiemann’s creations feature images of turtles, a nod to the painted turtles that still call Ell Pond home and the spotted turtles that once populated the pond.

“My interest is to put my art toward serving environmental causes,” Tiemann told the Free Press last month in an interview. “I think everybody has to look at how they, in their small corner of the world, can treat the world better, the earth better. For me, it was through my art.”

Dave Dickerson, president of the Ell Pond Improvement Council, said Tiemann approached him about creating a piece of artwork for the area around Ell Pond and he suggested turtles as a possible motif.

“It’s a really active area for them [turtles],” he said. “It went really well because I guess Lisa’s husband and somebody else dug the holes on Friday. That went pretty well. We had a pretty good turnout. It was really just mixing concrete and placing the two pads.”

Tiemann said books by artist and naturalist David Carroll, a New Hampshire resident and turtle expert, helped inspire the mosaics she created for the pond. She lent some of Carroll’s books to Michelle Casale, a recently graduated Melrose High School student who interned with Tiemann and helped her with creating the mosaics (“‘Education outside the classroom:’ Melrose senior internships leave the schoolhouse behind,” Free Press, May 28).

“These books were a great inspiration to me and thinking of all the life that was in that pond,” Tiemann said. “This is kind of honoring [the turtles], and perhaps a way to sit on these benches and contemplate the pond in a new way.”

Dickerson said enough volunteers showed up on Saturday that they were also able to undertake some invasive species control — targeting non-native and invasive plants that could throw the Ell Pond ecosystem out of whack.

“They kind of crowd out native plants and monopolize the ecosystem,” he said. “The one that we worked on on Saturday was bittersweet, a vine that strangles trees. We had a bunch of people cutting down vines. There are other types [of invasive species] there as well, but that was the one we worked on.”

Overall, the ecosystem is “pretty good for an urban pond,” Dickerson said, pointing out as an example the list of over 130 birds that can be seen around the pond — including rarities such as bald eagles and the Prothonotary warbler — and the large mouth bass found in the pond.

“Not all urban ponds can say that,” he said.

On the other hand, Ell Pond still faces the challenges presented by nearby antiquated storm drains and sewage systems, Dickerson said, which can lead to sewage mixing with storm water runoff and seeping into the pond.

“That’s more of a case-by-case basis — it’s more of a problem for swimming,” he said, pointing out that swimming was banned in Ell Pond in 1951. “For a small little park, it does serve an important ecological function.”