Above: Robert Redford and Sibylle Szaggars Redford at the Young Arts Salon Series Wednesday night. Photo credit: World Red Eye. Winning hearts is half the battle when it comes to saving the environment, and art can be one of its strongest allies. That’s the message iconic Hollywood actor Robert Redford and his wife, artist Sibylle Szaggars Redford, delivered to a crowd gathered at the headquarters of the the National YoungArts Foundation in Miami Wednesday night. The event, moderated by Dennis Scholl, Knight Foundation’s vice president for the arts, was the second in the YoungArts Salon Series, which brings together renowned creative minds to discuss issues about the cultural landscape and to interact with the audience. That interaction actually began the night before at the YoungArts’ Biscayne Boulevard campus, the former Bacardi Museum and Tower, with the world premiere of “The Way of the Rain Miami.” The collaborative artistic performance pays tribute to the Earth and—through abstract art, dance, film, music and words—calls attention to the damage being caused by man. Directed by Sibylle Redford, it also starred YoungArts alumni, other Miami artists and her famous husband, a longstanding environmentalist, in a special reading. The artist was born in Germany and had a successful career as a trader before turning to art full time. The seeds of the project were planted last year, with an earlier and less elaborate version of “The Way of the Rain” presented in Albuquerque, N.M., where the Redfords own a home. The desert landscape and its weather inspired the artist, who then expanded the scope of the work originally created with David Thor Jonsson and adapted it for Miami. “So, what we did last night, what we tried to convey, is a tiny, tiny little drop,” Sibylle Redford said during the YoungArts Salon. “But I believe there is a chance to save this planet.” The couple admitted that chance faces many obstacles, from money pressures to political interests, but Redford considers change inevitable.
