(Entered October 8, 2000)

What follows is a press release sent to IK! by Jon Lohman, Imagine Project Director. Contact him at jlohman@rocklibrary.com.

Press Release:

Imagine all the people...
Living life in peace...

The Rock &Roll Library, will commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the passing of John Lennon, seminal musician and peace activist, by spearheading a nationwide school curriculum and public arts initiative on the theme of "Imagine."

"Imagine crystallized John's dream for the world," Yoko Ono stated in the 1988 documentary of the same name, "it crystallized his idealism. It was something that he really wanted to say to the world." Lennon's dream of a world which transcends political, religious, and racial borders, where people of all races and cultural backgrounds can live together in peace, is as poignant today as it was when Imagine was first composed in 1971. There is perhaps no better way to honor the life of John Lennon than to inspire young people to imagine a better world.

The Imagine Public Arts Initiative will provide students with the opportunity to express their visions in an enduring, beautiful way, which will speak not only to the elegance of Lennon's words, but to the universal power of peace.

You may say I'm a dreamer But I'm not the only one...

The Rock & Roll Library Teacher Resource Center will provide curriculum for educators of grades K through 12 on John Lennon's life and work, featuring the Imagine Poetry Lesson. The Imagine Poetry Lesson will guide teachers through the process of inspiring students of all ages to write simple poems where they will imagine an ideal world. Much like Lennon's dream expressed in "Imagine," the lesson will serve not as a methodological prescription, but rather as an invitation for teachers and students to explore their visions for a better world together through writing.

The "Imagine" Lesson will culminate in a nationwide public arts initiative, where students of all ages and cultural backgrounds will create lasting testaments to Lennon's creative social vision - the Imagine Murals. Drawing from the students' own creative writings, school groups will work with community leaders and arts organizations to construct public murals of diverse mediums and styles on the theme of "Imagine." The Rock & Roll Library will provide guidance in mural construction, as well as provide a network for teachers to contact participating arts organizations in their area.

The Rock & Roll Library will facilitate mural dedications taking place simultaneously across the country on December 8, 2000, the twentieth anniversary of John Lennon's untimely death. Mural dedications will be promoted, publicized, and extensively covered on the Rock & Roll Library's website, http://www.rocklibrary.com.

Finished murals and designs will be posted on the Rock & Roll Library's Student Gallery. Students will have the opportunity to present their work online to a global audience, and view the creative endeavors of their peers. In this way, the young participants of the Imagine Project will see their work as a vital link in a creative chain - and understand that their contribution represents a meaningful participation in a larger social movement - a collective call for world peace.