For the past four months, this column has considered a problem of serious international scope: climate change. But other undesirable changes are afoot, e.g., the problem of unnatural, invasive, “exotic” species.  This problem, though not as immediately dangerous to human welfare as is climate change, always is with us. In one sense, the problem is worldwide because the ancestral home of an invasive species into, say, eastern Kansas may come from about anywhere in the world. The extent of invasiveness depends upon the capability of the new species to survive in its new home.

Kristin Goering

Kristin Goering of Fairway, Kan., was inspired to pursue art from a young age. She received her Fine Arts degree with an emphasis in printmaking from Bethel College in 1992. Her early career was spent as a freelance artist and illustrator with the Mennonite Press and Hearth Publishing in Newton, Kan. Her stylized brushstrokes and an intensified palette move beyond simple representationalism, conveying an inherent energy that extends the viewer’s concept of the natural world.

The following statement appears on Goering’s website:

April is a time for growth and change. Those bulbs resting underground all winter are now popping up leaves and flowers of fresh life through the soil. It’s a time where something that we can’t see changing is evolving into something beautiful. This is why it is fitting that April is National Parkinson’s Awareness Month. Individuals who are experiencing symptoms of Parkinson’s may feel like that flower bulb in the winter when they are diagnosed, and they may not understand they can still experience growth, independence, and beauty.

The 11th annual Grow Green Match Day on Friday, April 21, is a tremendous opportunity for the Manhattan community and Meadowlark Foundation. On that day, donations made through the Greater Manhattan Community Foundation to participating nonprofit agencies will receive a 50% match!