By Rose Cohen ’22
Arts & Entertainment Editor
Photos courtesy of Olive Rowel '24 and Jamie Eldridge '25
If you walk into the Dining Commons anytime between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. on a Monday, chances are you’ll see the Daisy Chain Art Guild selling colorful crocheted octopuses, pottery and black-and-white prints, among other pieces.
Since the beginning of the spring semester, members of the Mount Holyoke Ultimate Frisbee Team, known as “Daisy Chain,” have been tabling on campus to sell artwork made by the team members. But the idea for the Daisy Chain Art Guild formed a couple years earlier, during the spring 2020 semester, when a couple of team members were trying to figure out how to start fundraising for tournaments.
Due to COVID-19, many Daisy Chain members were living off campus when conversations about the Daisy Chain Art Guild started. Despite this distance, some players shared they now associate the Daisy Chain Art Guild with a sense of community.
“A big thing about frisbee and fundraising is that frisbee is just an amazing community just in itself,” Jamie Eldridge ’25, who makes the toy octopuses, said. “I think it’s cool finding this special kind of art community [within] the frisbee community.”
Olive Rowell ’24, a politics and art studio double major, echoed Eldrige’s sentiments regarding community.
“It’s all [about] making the team more cohesive,” they said. “It’s turned out to be a good way of meeting people as well, which I don’t think we were planning on. There’s been some cool people … [who] come up and buy some stuff and talk about their relationship to art … [It’s been] cool to learn about people that I didn’t even know existed here.”
According to Silvie Schlein ’23, there’s a sense of purpose and engagement that comes with being a member of the Daisy Chain Art Guild. “You’re building a community within your own space and bringing people together feels really good,” Schlein said. “Just the amount of time and effort and energy that all of our teammates that contribute art have given, it’s so much.”
Schlein also expressed gratitude for “the fact that we’re able to pass off some of that, even if it’s just a monetary contribution to another place that’s trying to do the same thing.” 50 percent of the Daisy Chain Art Guild’s tabling proceeds, up to $250 a month, will be donated to a soon-to-be-decided “queer-related” organization.
Along with the rest of the Daisy Chain Art Guild, Schlein, Rowell and Eldridge are trying to think of ways to expand their current customer base.
“People have been supporting us so much, but we are college students, and we only have so much funds,” Rowell said. “I mean, if it is possible for you to buy something every time please go ahead and do it, but we want to find other places to showcase it and that’s in the works right now too.” Rowell mentioned that the Daisy Chain Art Guild hopes to get in touch with other schools, perhaps including other members of the Five College Consortium, at some point in the future.
To learn more about the Daisy Chain Art Guild, check out their Instagram page — @daisychain_artguild — or find them in the entrance of the Dining Commons from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Mondays.