Family's garage door art wins library's Best in Show prize

The Elk Grove Village Public Library awarded its Best in Show prize on Valentine's Day to a family who's garage door art video captured people's hearts.

The video was submitted by the Weiss family of Elk Grove Village to the library's We ART All in This Together Contest. The contest challenged library patrons to share a hopeful message about how to make the most of life in a pandemic. Patrons could use whatever medium they preferred.

The contest received 11 entries, ranging from essays and artwork to photographs and videos, all offering heartwarming, inspiring stories about staying connected, learning new things and keeping a positive attitude during dark times.

Patrons were invited to view the entries on the library's website and vote for one to receive the Best in Show award. Prize winners in all categories, including the Best in Show, were announced on Feb. 14.

The video by the Weiss family featured what started as a Happy Birthday message for their daughter, a huge butterfly drawing on their chalkboard-painted garage door, and became an ongoing display of creative drawings and inspiring messages over many months. From warm summer days to chilly fall days, with Halloween, Christmas and New Year's all represented, the video shows all the family members creating big, colorful designs on the garage door.

Joanna Weiss, mother and lead artist, said their garage door project was a way to connect with people in their neighborhood, who would stop to comment or drive by to check out the latest work of art. She said it was the contest that inspired her to pull all the photos together and create a video, which has been viewed hundreds of times and has received many positive comments.

The video and all of the creative, inspiring contest entries can be viewed on the library's website: http://www.egvpl.org/events/we-art-together.html.