Several years have passed since I got to know Larry Bennett as one of my students. He was like the root of a tree; all knurly and scuffed up from a rough life. I could tell he had been through a lot. His intelligent, blue eyes scanned and peered and seemed to be hunting for something. What was it? He was resigned, but trying to root his way out from under piles of rocks. First , he tried one way with a certain type of media , then another way and yet again with another. Soon he was gathering skills like leaves around himself. I did not, at that time, get to witness the full foliage of his development because he finished his courses and moved on. The other day, after having been away for some time, he dropped in to my office , at Olympic College , where I work. He showed me some of his recent photographs. I was very pleasantly rewarded when I looked at what he had been doing. In fact I saw a man who had found answers and his art that expressed them. A tree grows as long as there is life in it and Larry has just started to bloom with such potentially magical flowers.

Joseph Silverthorn – formerly of Walt Disney Studios