The Kalamazoo Valley Museum celebrates their Fifth Annual Storytelling Festival: Searching for Peace! Storytellers from across the United States will come together to explore unity, equity, diversity, and inclusion for all.  This two-day event starts with Art Hop Friday night, February 3. Poet Terry Wooten opens the Festival at 6 p.m. Visual artist and speed painter Martina Hahn joins Joe Reilly in concert at 7. A variety of Martina’s paintings will also be on display and for sale.

Terry Wooten, author, speaker, educator, and performance poet, combines classic literature, folklore, and daily life into entertaining and uplifting poetry in motion.  He is a two-time recipient of the Michigan Creative Artist Award, author of ten books, and winner of the 2013 State History Award in Education from the Historical Society of Michigan for his Elder’s Project.  The Elder’s Project guides students on how to interview senior members of the community and put their stories into poetry.  He is also the builder of the Stone Circle, a triple ring of 88 large boulders located north of Traverse City.  The Stone Circle hosts poets, storytellers, and musicians each summer for community- and family-based stories.  

Joe Reily, singer-songwriter and educator from Ann Arbor, Michigan, uses his music as an invitation to heal our relationships with ourselves, with each other, and with the earth.  He believes, “we have the power to create peace in ourselves and our world.  Of course this is no easy task.  It takes diligent effort, resilience, and community support.”  A native environmentalist from Kalamazoo, Joe was selected as the official troubadour for the National Get Outdoors Day in 2011.  His latest children’s CD, The Circle, “waters seeds of hope and community through messages of friendship, diversity, common good, healing, and gratitude.”  Joe Reily will take to the stage at 7 p.m. with a family-friendly performance.

Our visual artist for Art Hop will be Martina Hahn, internationally-known speed painter and motivational speaker.  She has a talent for Trompe L’oeil mural paintings and portraitures.  Using two hands and all five senses, she creates amazing paintings to music in just six minutes.  Her paintings will be on display and for sale during Art Hop.  She is also founder of Boyne Arts Collective in Boyne City, Michigan, a cooperative for artists since 2008.  Hahn will join Joe Reilly for a live painting during his concert.  

The Festival continues on Saturday, February 4, with a full lineup of storytellers performing at the top of every hour starting at 10 a.m.  Also opening at 10 a.m. is the vendor fair full of authors, educators, artists, and community schools and organizations.