Bella Vista Arts Council recognizes area artist

Submitted photo Joanie Roberts
Submitted photo Joanie Roberts

The Bella Vista Arts Council is pleased to honor Joan Barrett Roberts as the May 2019 Artist of the Month.

Roberts will be honored at a public reception at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, May 22, at the Artist Retreat Center, 13467 Lookout Drive, Bella Vista.

Roberts is an author, writer and poet exploring the worlds of poetry, nature and photography. She loves to capture ordinary moments and reflect on the natural world and its intersection with ordinary daily life. She lives on Lake Ann in Bella Vista.

In 2015, Roberts started a local writer's group in Bella Vista called Village Lake Writers & Poets, sponsored by the Artist Retreat Center and the Bella Vista Public Library. The group's mission is to share the joy of writing, improve members' craft, and share the importance of good writing and wonderful storytelling in all forms.

In 2006, Roberts co-founded the Shadowleaves Company and started her blog, Shadowleaves on Lake Ann. She completed a Writer's Residency at the Eureka Springs Writer's Colony in 2014. She continues to write poetry and will publish her first volume of poems this summer. She also writes Poetry On Demand on a manual typewriter, and has performed at Bella Vista's Farmers Market, Bentonville's First Friday and Eureka Springs' White Street Art Walk for the Writer's Colony at Dairy Hollow. She is a member of Ozark Writer's League, Ozark Writer's Forum, Ozark Writers Inc., Poets Northwest Roundtable and Village Lake Writers & Poets.

More information on Roberts' work can be found online at https://shadowleavesonlakeann.com/ and on Facebook and Twitter.

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The Bella Vista Arts Council, an advisory board to the City Council, was created by the City Council in February 2016 to help promote the arts in Bella Vista. The board established an Artist of the Month program, in which selected artists and their work will be showcased to the public. Three volunteers serve on our selection committee -- Sara Parnell of the Artist Retreat Center, Pearl Williamson, president of Wishing Springs Gallery, and Demara Titzer, curator of several galleries in Bentonville.

The committee will choose each month from qualified artists, who must be residents of Bella Vista and have their work displayed somewhere in the city. Showcased artists will have their work displayed at the Artist Retreat Center, and during the month they are recognized the work will be on display in a location around the city, such as the Bella Vista Library or Historical Museum.

To submit your name or other nominations for consideration, contact Parnell at the Artist Retreat Center, 479-268-6463, or email [email protected].

General News on 05/15/2019