Big Fish - Gadsden Reads - A literacy project of mythic proportions

Gadsden Reads
One Book, One Community
Click here to watch a short video by author Daniel Wallace about
Gadsden's Big Fish

The Year of Alabama Art is officially underway
with the unveiling of our Big Fish on Broad -
10 Catfish by Alabama Artists (including author, Daniel Wallace). [ Click here for Photos ]

The year of 2006 will forever be marked in Gadsden's history as the year the City of Champions began its One Book, One Community reading promotion project. Introduced in 1998 as a tool to promote literacy, One Book, One Community has grown from its modest beginnings in a single U.S. state and has expanded through hundreds of communities and several countries.

Gadsden's One Book project, aptly named Gadsden Reads, is a cooperative effort between the Alabama Humanities Foundation (the state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities), the City of Gadsden, the Gadsden Public Library, Gadsden State Community College, the Gadsden Times, and the Mary G. Hardin Center for Cultural Arts. This year, Gadsden Reads will focus on Daniel Wallace's book Big Fish: A Novel of Mythic Proportions. Gadsden Reads Big Fish is sponsoring free monthly events that include a screening of Tim Burton's film adaptation of Big Fish, lectures on Big Fish as literature and myth, and a two-day writer residency with author Daniel Wallace. All members of the community are encouraged to attend sponsored events, as well as create their own related events.

Get your free copy of the Big Fish novel at these locations:

  Carver Museum
  Family Success Center
  Gadsden Public Library
  Gadsden State Community College
Mary G. Hardin Center for Cultural Arts

Click here to watch Dr. Noble's lecture on Big Fish

Big Fish of Broad Street

In addition to promoting literacy, and in keeping with the theme of Big Fish, "Gadsden Reads Big Fish" will have a visual component to the project in the form of the Big Fish of Broad Street exhibit. Big Fish of Broad Street will be a series of six-foot catfish, painted by Alabama artists and placed on Broad Street and at sponsoring businesses. Local businesses and individuals are encouraged to sponsor a catfish to be painted and placed around town. The Big Fish of Broad Street catfish will be unveiled on January 1, 2007 to remain on display until their auctioning off during the Cultural Arts League's 2007 August Charity Auction. Artists who are interested in submitting a proposal for painting a fish are encouraged to do so via email to bigfish@culturalarts.org or by dropping their proposal by the Mary G. Hardin Center for Cultural Arts.