Flints Hills Counterpoint is a creative placemaking county-wide engagement initiative that is centered on the reclamation of 13 acres of land in Marion County, Kansas. Flints Hills Counterpoint is a creative placemaking county-wide engagement initiative that is centered on the reclamation of 13 acres of land in Marion County, Kansas sponsored in part by Prairie Muses in collaboration with Chamber
Music at The Barn, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Kansas Creative Arts Industries Commission. The project germinated when the Natural Resources Conservation Service and Kansas Forest Service were contacted by Susan Mayo and her husband, Nasir Islam, to restore their land. At the same time, Mayo became acquainted with Kansas City Art Institute Associate Professor of Filmmaking Cyan Meeks during their residencies in the Matfield Green-based Tallgrass Artist Residency and mutually agreed to seek a future collaboration. The landowners will pay the additional restoration cost. Everything about this reclamation process inspired Mayo and Meeks to collaborate now. Supported by Prairie Muses and numerous grants, Flints Hills Counterpoint has become a multi-year collaborative including music composed by Mayo for an audiovisual film Meeks will create to experience a chronological interpretation of sensory field recordings taken from the perspective of the land, flora, and fauna—the witnesses to a prairie and forest reclamation process. This final performance and film will evolve and premier in June 2023. The Mayo farm will also host the annual Counterpoint major event in June 2022, featuring art installations by Shin-hee Chin, Stan Herd, and Linnebur and Miller, who will also dress and interact with audiences as "flora and fauna" characters of the prairie. The music for the 2022 extravaganza will feature Grammy Winning composer Eugene Friesen presenting and performing significant excerpts from his two prairie-inspired symphonies, Grasslands: Prairie Voices and Carl Sandburg's 'Prairie.' Friesen will be joined by Tabor choir members and countywide community voices led by Greg Zielke, the WoodFest Symphonia, and narrators Wes Jackson (Grasslands) and Clayton Crawford (Carl Sandburg). In the meantime, artists are beginning to work in surrounding small communities throughout Marion County to perform and engage residents in ways to celebrate the prairie wherever they may live creatively. Community members have helped to develop and create activities; and everyone will be invited to experience the land transition through visits and other events, including unique arts-infused Marion County bicycle, bus, and car prairie-based tours; hands-on sound collection activities that celebrate this place and foster personal exposure to strengthen awareness and inspire land stewardship. The first tour, a Musical Bike Adventure Ride, occurs on Saturday, April 17, 2021. For tickets or more information, see https://flinthillscounterpoint.org/events/
Nearby rural communities of Peabody, Marion, and Hillsboro have already proven to be ideal partners. Science, art, and music faculty from regional public schools and Tabor College have agreed to partner throughout all project phases, collaborating in various projects, including field trips, workshops, classroom presentations, and art installations. The Marion County Commissioners have agreed to be partners with the project. Throughout the next two years, informational presentations, onsite celebrations/work-parties leading up to annual festivities June 2022 and 2023 will be open to all - attracting both rural/agricultural and urban/artistic audiences, bringing together the diverse population of Kansas to engage in a collective "counterpoint," a Flint Hills Counterpoint.
