Greeley Colorado is attempting to break a Guinness World Record this month for the “longest pavement chalk art.” The Great Chalk-A-Lot is a community event that you’ll want to be a part.
On September 6th, 2014 citizens of Greeley, Colorado will draw 3.7 miles of pavement chalk art in the parking lots surrounding UNC’s main campus in order to break the previous record made on June 5th, 2009 in Jena, Germany. Students of Jena completed the longest chalk art at 3.47 miles, made up of 6 foot by 6 foot square segments.
The Chalk A-Lot event will be held in UNC’s Student Center parking lot, located on 11th ave and 22nd street and will start at 8 a.m. on Saturday, September 6th and end at 6 p.m. that night. You can register your team online, or come the day of the event and chalk up as many squares as you would like. After all, there are 3,005 squares up for grabs.
Participants can take on a square by themselves, or have a team of hands to help create a 6×6 masterpiece. The theme of the nearly 4 mile long work of art will be nature. All art must be representational (our apologies to you Kandinsky contemporaries out there, no abstract art will be accepted.)
No art experience is necessary and all the chalk will be provided. Nearly 75,000 pieces of chalk have been purchased for the event. Stencils, or pictures to draw from will be provided if coloring is more your thing, or you can draw your own composition. Art coaches will be available on hand to help.
Ed Rogers, Former Greeley Central art teacher and local artist gave life to this momentous idea last December when trying to come up with a community activity that would really allow for individual expression and “lead to an exciting goal.” Roy Otta, Greeley City Manager was thrilled with the idea, said Rodgers, and immediately got the ball rolling on the Chalk A-Lot event.
His hope for the event is that there is enough participants to make the art come to life, and to break the record on a beautiful fall day. Ed Rodgers is hopeful that Greeley will succeed. Rodgers said in an interview with BandWagon Magazine “In regards to achieving a world record in art, My thoughts are… WHY NOT US! We in Greeley have an opportunity to do something grand and have loads of fun in the process.”
The Greeley Creative District is working along side many memeber of the community including the Chalk A- Lot sub-committee which is made up of art educators such as Ruth Wydeven, Patty Jones, Ed Roger and the School of Art and Design Director at UNC, Andrew Liccardo. The committee also features artist, Tom Bator, Assistant City manager, Becky Safarik and Community resource coordinator, Deb Deboutez. Chalk A-Lot is truly an example of how the creative efforts in Greeley have made a more cohesive community that thrives to bring the people of Greeley fun ways to interact and make our city “great from the ground up.”
Bring your kids, your club, your family, church group, best friends, and neighbors to this family friendly, record-breaking event. Registration is easy and can done by calling the City of Greeley 970-350-9774 where they will take your name and the number of people in your group.
PICTURED: Ed Rogers Promoting the Chalk A-Lot event at Friday Fest earlier this month.
