Shake-A-Leg nonprofit to host art gala in form of fashion show to celebrate 25 years

To celebrate 25 years of community involvement, nonprofit Shake-A-Leg Miami is hosting an art gala along with a theater play in the form of a fashion show.

Shake-A-Leg is a program in which children and adults with physical, developmental and economic challenges are exposed to water activities such as sailing, swimming, kayaking and other watersports.

For the show from 7 to 11 p.m. Saturday, all the artwork and clothes are made from recycled sails, said David McCauley, the founder of Rise Up gallery and art curator for the show. The show will be held at 2620 S. Bayshore Dr. in Coconut Grove. General admission tickets range from $300 to $999.

“For this particular exhibition, I think the creative process is one of the most important parts,” McCauley said.

For the 30 artists to gain inspiration for their artwork, they were invited to spend a day on the water with people who have disabilities, McCauley said. Each artist was given a three-by-three-foot piece of sailcloth to use as their artwork and the pieces will be sold to raise money. The prices range from $500 to $4,000.

McCauley said he hopes the art show can help people “celebrate the diversity of what people are able to create.”

As for the fashion, all 90 pieces are made from recycled sails, artist Jens Werner said.

Werner said his goal was to create wearable art that tells a story.

“I wanted to try to manipulate sail,” he said.

Some of the clothes include dresses and long coats that will be displayed by 30 models.

“The most important thing of the whole project is that we just tried to push and increase the advantage of this amazing organization to different people,” Werner said.

One of the challenging aspects of using the material: having one chance to get the patterns and designs right, because they had a limited number of sails.

“Fashion is change,” he said. “For me it was a playground to push out there a new concept of displaying fashion.”

This story was originally published October 25, 2016 at 12:30 PM with the headline "Shake-A-Leg nonprofit to host art gala in form of fashion show to celebrate 25 years."