BPP diversity festival honors King's legacy

From noon to midnight Monday, people of all ages celebrated Martin Luther King Jr. with The Bloomington Playwright's Project. The BPP decided to put on the event in honor of King's dream of peace and togetherness. The festival was centered around diversity and encouraging attendees to embrace their differences.\n"You're all a rainbow," said Terri Klingelhoefer of the Klingel-Engle puppet troupe to a group of children and adults at the BPP's Diversity Festival, "a whole bunch of colors; a whole bunch of differences."\nKlingelhoefer and her puppets were just one of the many groups that helped spread the message of diversity for 12 hours on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. \n"There is music, dance, theater, drama, poetry and puppetry," said BPP producer Breshaun Joyner. "We wanted to parallel the diversity of people with the diversity of arts." \nParticipants celebrated by experiencing a variety of activities, including storytelling from all over the world, a reading of "Harry and the Streetbeat" by African-American playwright OyamO, belly dancing and a performance by Turkish pianist Hakan Toker. \nJoyner said the "Words of Peace" open mic poetry and monologues was one of the highlights.\n"People can speak on peace or the aftermath of not having any," Joyner said. "For example, a woman from Israel has some poems she has written about the strife going on (over there)."\nRichard Perez, artistic director, said much of the festival's activities were geared toward a young audience.\nOne of those activities was the "Make Your Own World Instrument" activity with the Musical Youth Arts Orchestra. Children were invited to make a variety of instruments, including drums from oatmeal cans, rainsticks from paper towel tubes and kazoos from empty thread spools and wax paper. \n"We tried to come up with diverse instruments," Kristen Bellisario, a worker, said. \nPutting on the Diversity Festival was no small feat, Perez explained.\n"This was the third year in a row," he said. "We had this idea to introduce the community to more diverse forms of performance."\nThe Diversity Festival had once been an annual event in Bloomington, but through a time of management change, the festival stopped, Marketing Director Candace Decker said. \n"After the current management had taken over, we found some old information about the festival," she said. "They had originally done it for many years."\nSince the festival is free, Perez explained, the BPP had to contact performing groups, find volunteers and apply for grants to fund the festival. This year's grant came from Bloomington's "Day On, Not Day Off" program.\n"It's so wonderful to see people give their time to celebrate diversity," Perez said. \nMartin Luther King Jr. Day seemed like the perfect day for the Diversity Festival, Joyner said. \n"We are honoring Dr. King's vision of different people working, living, and performing together," she said. \nPamela Mejia brought her daughter to the festival to celebrate King's work. \n"It's Martin Luther King Jr. Day and we wanted this experience," she said. "We wanted to do something today to connect to that. We were curious about this day."\nThe many volunteers and employees of Bloomington Playwright's Project enjoyed the festival.\n"It was incredible," volunteer Angela Floy said. "There's something for everyone"