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Artist posting paintings on Holland trees told to stop

He's posted more than 800 times over three years.

HOLLAND, Mich. — An artist who attached small paintings containing lines of poetry to Holland trees is now searching for a new medium after city officials warned him to stop posting. 

Steven Penkevich started placing snippets of other poets' works on trees throughout downtown Holland around three years ago. The pieces are posted on his Instagram and Twitter accounts: @poe_a_tree

"A friend of mine had this funny idea, 'People should just leave a poem in Centennial Park like a medieval decree,'" Penkevich said. "We laugh about it.  And I thought, 'Oh, that's actually not a bad idea.'"

Over the years, Penkevich graduated to oil pastels, etching lyrics onto landscapes. He's posted to Instagram more than 820 times and amassed nearly 2,000 followers. 

"I did not expect how much support I would get from it, especially people I didn't even realize knew about it," he said. "Many people have reached out to me [saying], 'That really makes my day when I see it downtown,' which is really touching."

Penkevich recently got an Instagram message from the Holland Parks and Recreation Department calling for a "complete cessation of adhering any attachments, flyers or other forms of graffiti to City of Holland Property." 

The city has no opinion on the project, but it violates an ordinance, said Parks Director Andy Kenyon. 

"We don't allow anybody for signs for lost dogs, for car washes, for any kind of sale they're having at their home," Kenyon said. "We don't allow that for any public space either, so this falls right into that." 

Dubbing it "a bummer," Penkevich said he is not angry with the city. 

"I understand why it happened, and, in a way, it was a good wake up call to try to do it more effectively and in a way that's better for anyone," he said. 

The artist received a swell of online support after posting about the warning. Many people asked for him to send paintings. The Park Theatre, located on South River Avenue, is now displaying some of Penkevich's work. 

"It means a lot to see people interacting with poetry in a way they usually wouldn't," Penkevich said. 

"I like how a community kind of built out of that idea," he said. 

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