Maryo Gard Ewell will open the third biennial Maine International Conference on the Arts with a keynote speech exploring ideas on "Rural Community Development In & Through the Arts" -- specifically in Maine, the nation's most rural state.

The Arts in the Small Community: A National Plan, wasa first-of-its-kind, three-year project lead by Robert E. Gard and his Community Arts Development team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. The 1969 plan dealt with ways of developing greater interest and participation in the arts in communities of 10,000 or less; and created an "arts and" blueprint for action: the arts AND business, the arts AND health, the arts AND youth, among others.

Maryo is the daughter of Robert E. Gard and the President of the Robert E. Gard Foundation, as well as Director of Community Impact for the Community Foundation of the Gunnison Valley, CO. Her specialty is linking the arts to the furthering of broader community ends.

Please join us Thursday, September 27 for an opening reception and entertainment at 4 p.m., followed by Maryo's keynote, to kick off the third Maine International Conference on the Arts.