Bringing Nature into the Southern Illinois Medical Development’s Waterloo Clinic

Early in 2013 Clifftop and its members were offered an exciting opportunity. Bill Rebholz, Executive Director of Waterloo’s Hamacher Street medical complex (the Illinois Medical Development Corporation), approached us with an interesting idea. He was planning to upgrade and update artwork in the hallways of their primary care building. He was impressed with the beauty and quality of Clifftop’s photographic imagery, nearly all contributed by our talented membership, and featured on our website and outreach media. He asked if we could provide five to ten photo images of the unparalleled natural beauty of Southwestern Illinois to adorn the walls of their facility.

We asked our willing members to each submit up to five images for the project. Twenty-one members submitted a total of 86 images. In March, we assembled two impartial judges to pick semi-finalists for the project. Pam Jacobs, Director of the Monroe-St. Clair-Madison County University of Illinois Extension Service, and Jane Huebner, Waterloo High School’s art teacher, graciously served as judges, and, armed only with the anonymous imagery, choose 11 images to forward to Bill Rebholz and his staff for consideration. In June, Bill Rebholz and staff picked five finalist images and photographers.

Photographs by Chris Benda, Priscilla Bollinger, Paul Feldker, Dennis FitzWilliam, and Dennis Jacobsen were selected for display at the clinic. Semi-finalist entries included additional work by Ms. Bollinger and Mr. Feldker, and by Eric Fries, Cindy Nicolls, and Justin Polacek.

Congratulations to the finalists and a special thanks to all who submitted pictures. All photographs submitted for consideration are displayed here in alphabetical order by the photographer’s last name. The photos are displayed over five pages: you may view them as thumbnails or as a slide show. To view the images in larger size, please click on the first photo on each page, then use the toggle arrows to view each of 20 photos per page.

Thanks to Clifftop’s creative membership, many local residents will now see firsthand that the natural beauty of our beloved landscape is really good medicine.

[Show as slideshow]