Felder Rushing coming to Living Sculpture Conference

It’s official. Felder Rushing is coming to the Living Sculpture Conference July 22 sponsored by Cornell’s Garden-Based Learning Program. (Full disclosure: I work in Cornell’s Dept. of Horticulture, the home of the Garden-Based Learning program.)

And he’ll be driving his pick-up truck garden up from Mississippi, too — complete with pink flamingos and bottle trees. (Image below.)

Felder is renowned for what some might call his offbeat garden designs. But the former Mississippi State Extension turf specialist is a respected author (Passalong Plants and other titles) and radio host (Mississippi Public Broadcasting’s Gestalt Gardener).

In addition to being a conference participant, Felder will park his pick-up somewhere near the Ag Quad (details to come) around noon on the 22nd for a short, impromptu talk that’s open to the public focusing on his “”slow, easy, cheap and green” approach to gardening.

That evening, Living Sculpture Conference participants and attendees of the New York State Master Gardener Conference will be treated to a presentation by Felder on Yard Art: The Good, the Bad, and the Unbelievable. (View some examples from Felder’s front yard.)

On the evening of the 23rd, he’ll reprise his pick-up truck talk in downtown Ithaca.

The Living Sculpture Conference will feature an opening keynote will be by Dr. Frank Rossi, Extension Turfgrass Specialist and Associate Professor of Turfgrass Science at Cornell University, who will speak on The Thrill of the Grass: Engaging Earth’s Canvas. Hands-on workshops the rest of the day include:

* Build Sod Sculptures
* Fantastic Patterns in the Lawn
* Veggie Art
* Woven Branch Art
* Build a tree sculpture
* Table Top Herbal Topiary
* A Momentary Glimpse: Creating Ephemeral Earth Art
* A “Can Do” Attitude!
* Creating larger scale earth art
* How to capture it! A documentation workshop

Felder’s truck, image courtesy Karen at Rurality.