12-07-06 | Tile making is the grout that binds artist/volunteers to costal rail…
06-16-06 | Solana Beach Arches
05-07-06 | Local dubbed ‘tool queen’ and ‘unofficial safety officer’ among…
02-07-06 | Volunteer Katie Pelisek — Inspired by Community Art Projects
View PDF | Community Project Special Recognition
February 7, 2006
Volunteer Katie Pelisek — Inspired by Community Art Projects
Community art is when people throughout the neighborhoods in town — hence, the community — Gather to create art from a project designed to enhance the beauty of their environment.
The community-created art can be functional as well as for beautification. It also can be educational.
The Coastal Community Rail Trail Arches bordering the north end of Del Mar and south entrance to Solana Beach along Highway 101 is all of those things — thanks to community participants from throughout the coastal region, its designer Betsy Schulz, and a handful of her hand-picked artist/volunteers including Katie Pelisek.
On two of the four hand-sculpted concrete columns, metal and ceramic artifacts along with story tiles, small signs, fossils and shells — created, collected and donated by the community — artistically provide insight into the history of Solana Beach. The other columns support the city's name.
It was a heck of a task, and everyone who participated seemed up to the job.
“It’s one thing to come up, with a really cool design, but it’s another thing to have it be ‘buildable,’ said graphic artist and landscape designer Katie Pelisek, who moved to the area 12 years ago from Maryland.
Of the arches, she said, “This thing is a landmark. It’s going to be around for generations and everybody that goes by it is just awestruck that we have that kind of public art and that kind of talent making public art.
About the small-town project, Pelisek said, “When it comes to community art, there are no small jobs. There’s a job for everybody.” Pelisek, who worked as a graphic-arts designer for 20 years, made the move to gardening and landscape design because the art became too computerized for her.
“I just got to the point where I didn't like everything going over to the computer,” she said “When I started, it was all hands-on stuff, and with having to sit at a computer, it just didn’t fit my lifestyle, my personality.
“When I moved here from Maryland with my husband, I took the docent class at Quail Botanical Gardens because I wanted to learn about the plants out here because where I was from — we had winter!
“What I found was I really enjoyed spending my volunteer hours working on the exhibits at Quail for the Del Mar Fair, now the San Diego County Fair. I worked on the fair exhibit for a number of years with Bill Teague and, after four years of that, he encouraged me to get into landscape design.
“I've been at it about four years now and I love it. I will never not do it," she said.
Building flower-and-garden-show exhibits and arches takes some serious girl power. And according to Schulz, “Katie's not afraid to use a power drill on a ladder.”
“I grew up one of five girls and one of your girls has to be your tomboy,” Pelisek said, “so I’m the one who spent all the weekends helping my dad with all his projects, learning how to put up drywall and all that kind of stuff.”
“So there’s pretty much nothing I don’t want to know how to do or can’t do.”
Then, with a burst of laughter she said, “I just really enjoy — construction!”
About working on the arches with Schulz, she said, “Betsy needs problem-solvers out there, and that’s what I try and do for her. Because we're both graphic-arts designers, we problem-solve a lot the same way. If she says, ‘figure out how to mount this piece of metal.’ I'll figure it out."
To Pelisek, the most satisfying thing about the arches project was “to be part of something that is so beautiful and so accessible. It really creates a destination, a place where you want to go and take people,” she said.
Pelisek said anyone who wants to participate in community art should simply ask when they hear about or see something going on in their neighborhood.
“There’s so many ways to get involved because people who think they aren’t that artistic, but have a lot of problem-solving skills, could be there just to help work out the details. Sometimes, it can be as simple as bringing lunch or some hot coffee ...
“Anything is just so appreciated when you’re standing out there on the street comer,” she said with a laugh, referring to working on the arches near the intersection of Via de la Valle and Highway 101.
