OK, now what?

So here I am, a year ago, trying to get other artists interested in this concept. I was showing at Eastern Market ( www.easternmarket.net) every weekend at that time. There is a wealth of talent there. The three artists I thought would be great to work with on this project were supportive, but had mixed feelings about it. However, Tom Rall who is the market manager on Sundays was very proactive and wrote a great article for the web page. Tom was our first contributer to the cause. I am a stubborn woman and once I got this notion in my head, I was determined to make it happen. I forwarded some e-mails around to the press. I sent a few to Mr. Gopnik and he finally answered me. Essentially his first response was a polite, "no, that's not a good idea". We did engage in further discussion and I have to say he sent a long and thoughtful answer. I disagreed with his point of view, but through this discussion formulated a public art project that will entertain and enlighten the public, as well as challenge the artists. Lucky for me, Andrew Noyes of Voice of the Hill ( Stein's project ) newspaper was intrigued by my quest. At my referral, Andrew interviewed Maryam Ovissi, the president of a nonprofit called Evolving Perceptions. Maryam and I had talked about the as yet unnamed SYNERGY project, and she and her board were considering taking it on. Maryam is an administrator with experience in art projects. She suggested that we have a meeting to see what kind of interest the project would generate among the art community. Our first meeting was held Oct. 18th, 2004 at Karma Restaurant, 19th and I Sts, NW, DC. Thanks to Lenny Campello of www.dcartnewsblospot and Jesse Cohen of www.artdc.org , we had a lovely turnout of very accomplished artists. Here's some names: Tim Tate ( glass artist), Lenny Campello www.thefrasergallery.com , Jesse Cohen( photographer), Maggie O'Neil ( Pandala Anderson), Kaytie Didriksen ( painter of the notorious portrait of Bush from the Funky Furniture exhibit at City Museum), Dave Mills ( graphic artist and painter who has helped a lot), Michael Jantz (our token musician who wrote an amazing song for SYNERGY at www.michaeljantz.com),
several panda artists and a great turnout from the Washington Glass School www.washingtonglassschool.com. We had 30 artists in attendance and the meeting was filmed by Nigel Parkinson of Focus Entertainment. It was a great beginning!!