GOTTA Gallery

Gallery Of Teeny Tiny Art!

The Little BIG Idea Grant program also celebrates artistic creativity and encourages people of all ages to apply. Siblings Bryn and Linden Rothshank are some of the youngest Elkhart County change-makers to receive microgrant funding. Husband and wife artists Brooke and Justin Rothshank have each been independently recognized nationally for their artwork; Brooke for her miniature paintings in watercolor, and Justin for his approach to his ceramic forms displaying unique surface decorations, artist-designed decals, and incised stamping techniques.

The Rothshank siblings—Bryn, 9, and Linden, 13—attend Bethany Christian Schools, and came up with an idea to share art throughout the Goshen community by creating a Little Free Art Gallery. According to their mom, the gallery plans to present four indoor gallery openings—one for each season. A $500 microgrant award from the Little BIG Idea Grant program will help Linden and Bryn—along with a helper, Bryn’s friend Chiara Reuel—bring the art gallery project to life.

“The kids’ idea is to call the gallery the ‘GOTTA’—the Gallery of Teeny Tiny Art,” said Brooke Rothshank, who was previously awarded grant funding of her own to offer art classes for inmates at the Elkhart County Jail. “The gallery would be like a Little Free Library, but with an art display. The first opening of the gallery will be at Hometown Holiday—Downtown Goshen’s December First Fridays event. The kids are looking forward to it. They plan to have a donation jar available so that any proceeds can go to benefiting the Humane Society of Elkhart County.”

Not surprisingly, young Bryn and Linden—chips off the old block—take their chief inspiration from their artistic parents.

“I like to build Legos, play soccer, and swim,” said Linden, “and I love to work in my dad’s clay studio making clay foxes.”

“My favorite subject is art,” added Bryn. “I like to write, play with my pets, and paint in my mom’s painting studio.”

Kudos to Brooke and Justin for, clearly, setting good examples with each and every piece of art they produce. Congrats, Bryn and Linden!