PORT TOWNSEND — Oh, the simple joys: the alphabet, a library, some art floating overhead.
Melody Sky Eisler lives among all three. And she’s inviting people of all ages over to her place from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. today.
As director of the Port Townsend Library, she and her staff are hosting a free party with three art shows and an alphabet-theme craft in the children’s room — “fun for all ages,” she promised.
The event at the Port Townsend Library, 1220 Lawrence St., celebrates “A to Z,” a permanent installation of 26 playful, three-dimensional letters suspended above the stacks and tables in the children’s section. The library commissioned the fiber artists of the North Peninsula Surface Design Association (NPSDA) chapter to create it all.
Along with the Alphabet Art array, visitors can lay eyes on two other Art in the Library shows now on display: Bill Nelson’s oil and watercolor paintings of Port Townsend plus Fred Miller’s oils and pastels.
For its adult-oriented art shows, the library collaborates with the Northwind Arts Center, Eisler said.
For the children’s room, Port Townsend’s Swan School has created a mural and local artist Max Grover painted a salmon sculpture; “A to Z” is only the latest addition to that space. And it’s already a success.
“Right after we finished hanging the letters, a father and his two daughters were singing their ABCs and pointing to each letter,” Eisler said this week.
“Some of the letters have a clear narrative and others are more mysterious,” she added.
The G is for gnome, with its moss and other natural ingredients; the H for a whimsical house and the O is for owl.
NPSDA artist Diana Gipson, who shepherded the whole alphabet project to completion, made the O in honor of the great horned owls she’s known. Before Port Townsend she lived in Idaho, surrounded by those birds. She came to recognize the differences among the individual owls and even gave them names.
So as her alphabet letter took shape, it became Ollie, a girl owl with hand-dyed silk in three colors and antique jet buttons.
Artists Mary O’Shaughnessy and Janice Speck took the next letter and turned it into a felted fairy tale. Their P depicts “The Princess and the Pea,” the Hans Christian Andersen story of a young woman so sensitive she could feel the diminutive pea under a tall stack of bedding.
The letter, just 12 inches high, has the regal maiden perched atop 14 little mattresses.
“All the letters surpassed our wildest expectations in terms of attention to craft and detail,” Eisler said.
“It is so fun to see the kids and grownups, being utterly delighted as they look up to each letter,” she added. “I could wax poetic about this alphabet for hours.”
The Port Townsend Public Library Foundation paid the NPSDA a $500 honorarium for the project, Eisler noted — money invested in creating a place where children can have a good time discovering the alphabet’s possibilities.
“The art was such an act of love by the NPSDA,” she said. “We are so grateful that the members of [the association] shared their talent and art with the library for our littlest readers.”
She then extended an invitation to children, their parents and their friends: Come on over to my place, which is open seven days a week and has a bunch of free activities.
“The library is your gateway to the world and beyond,” Eisler said. “Explore a world of stories in the pages of our books, and connect with other families in our community during our weekly storytimes.”
For details about such activities and to find out more about what’s on the shelves, visit ptpubliclibrary.org/library or call 360-385-3181.
