2025 ARTISTS
Session II
Seyko Groves
Soulful singer and songwriter Seyko Groves’ musical talents were nurtured during her formative years in church and school choirs. Today, after two solid decades as a showstopping frontliner and collaborative songwriter for Kansas City bands such as the Motown-inspired Freedom Affair, Groves is poised to take the artistic leap as independent soloist performing her own original material. Inspired by two of the music industry’s greatest songwriters, Diane Warren and Lori McKenna, Groves released her first original singles in 2023. Her Escape To Create residency is dedicated to expanding her talents as a solo artist across music genres.
Accompanied by local musicians, Groves will perform a selection of jazz, soul and R&B standards and introduce new works at The REP Theatre on February 21st at 7:30pm. Tickets will be available through The REP Theatre at http://lovetherep.com see Shows & Events.
Florian Huttner
Florian Huttner comes to Seaside from Bad Tolz, Bavaria, Germany, a small, picturesque town on the Isar River south of Munich near the foothills of the Alps. An independent contemporary artist, educator and collaborator, Huttner’s practice is marked by a deep understanding of contemporary art, highly honed technical skill and a research-based investigative approach. He has taught seminars and workshops at several institutions including the Academy of Fine Art, Munich and the School of Walls and Space, Royal Academy of the Visual Arts Copenhagen. His “Freie Flusszone Bilderkisten” (Free River Zone Picture Boxes) is a series of artworks created over the past decade that explore the dynamics and beauty of the major river landscapes of Europe. Huttner will explore the Choctawhatchee River and research the Mississippi River in preparation for expanding the project in the U.S.
Huttner’s residency will be celebrated at Anne Hunter Gallery in downtown Seaside on February 16th, 4:00pm – 6:00pm in a reception honoring the artists of Escape To Create.
Ann Marie Jackson
Ann Marie Jackson is an award-winning writer, editor and non-profit leader. With degrees from Harvard and Stanford in political science and economics, the former Foreign Affairs Officer for the U.S. Department of State lives in San Miguel Allende where she is the culture writer for Mexico’s leading English-language newspaper and founder of a non-profit that supports small women-owned businesses. Jackson’s debut novel, The Broken Hummingbird, received widespread critical praise and received a number of prominent awards including Finalist for the 2023 International Book Awards for Women’s Fiction, Silver Winner 2024 Independent Publishers Award and Finalist for the 2024 National Indie Excellence Awards for Literary Fiction. While in Seaside, Jackson will advance her second novel that celebrates a tightly knit circle of female friends whose bonds become marked by betrayal, reinvention, inequality and empowerment.
Jackson will contribute a reading from her award-winning novel with book sales and signing at Anne Hunter Gallery on February 23rd at 4:00pm – 5:30pm.
Terri Pollack
Terri Pollack is a painter, printmaker and community arts patron based in Kansas City. She is a graduate of the Kansas City Art Institute and studied fresco painting at Vera Cruz University, Xalapa, Mexico with famed muralist Maestro Melchor Peredor. Pollack has participated in group and solo shows primarily in the mid-west, Santa Fe, and Chicago. She also participated in the beloved Brooklyn Art Library’s Sketchbook Project, a seventeen-year long student initiative that evolved into an international collection of over 50,000 artist sketchbooks. Captivated by everyday scenes, Pollack’s residency focuses on process and progression from painting to relief prints based on drawings and watercolor impressions recorded in a sketchbook format for later enlargement.
Pollack’s residency will be celebrated in an Escape To Create reception at Anne Hunter Gallery on February 16th at 4:00pm - 6:00pm.
Dan White
Dan White is an internationally published photographer, photojournalist and freelancer based in Kansas City. White began his career at his hometown newspaper in Flint, MI before attending the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Shortly after joining the Kansas City Star after graduation, White was a member of the staff team awarded the Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of the 1981 collapse of the Hyatt Regency’s elevated glass and steel walkways, killing over one hundred people and forever altering the landscape of the city. White’s iconic photo of the disaster was published worldwide and became a symbol of failed modern construction in America. In addition to his international career over more than four decades, White has taught at the University of Kansas. He was inducted into the Missouri Photojournalism Hall of Fame in 2019. Renowned for his unique use of light, composition and “the moment,” White will primarily use infrared film to imbue a timeless quality to images and capture the seamless merging of past and present in Seaside.
White’s residency will be celebrated in an Escape To Create public reception at Anne Hunter Gallery on February 16th at 4:00pm – 6:00pm.