Botanic garden sculpture was a campus work in progress

It started with the leftover cardboard from the back of a legal pad.

Sometime in 2009, Dan Peragine, a visual and digital arts teacher at The Winston School in Del Mar, carved a series of shapes into the board and set it on his desk.

In recent months, Peragine took the concept and turned it into a full-size sculpture to be installed at the San Diego Botanic Garden in Encinitas. It is one of 23 works in the 2012-13 "Sculpture in the Garden" exhibit.

His process was unorthodox to say the least: Working in full view of his students, Peragine designed, carved and painted while fielding questions from fourth-graders and high school students alike.

"Even the little kids got to see this thing through its stages of development," he said. "They really got a good sense of how things are made."

This weekend the resulting project, entitled "Transpersonal," was scheduled to be dedicated along with 22 others that will remain in place through next spring.

"Sometimes they refer to me as the artist in residence here," Peragine said of his 24 years at The Winston School. "They're really gracious to allow me to pursue my own work on weekends and after school. The project was highly visible on campus as I was working on this piece ---- I had several students observing my design process.

"They would come in after the weekend and I'd have a whole new section done," he added, referring to the arrangement as "a symbiotic relationship ---- I share a lot of my process with the students, and I ask for feedback."

A dedication of the 23 sculptures was planned for Saturday afternoon, and Peragine's work can be seen along with the others from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week at 230 Quail Gardens Drive in Encintas.

"We are very proud of Dan," the school's headmaster, Mike Peterson, said in a news release about the exhibit. "He helped build The Winston School's art program into one of the best student programs in San Diego, and we are fortunate to have daily exposure to his work and talent."

Last month, four Winston School students ---- Nikolai Spiegelberg, Daniel Smith, Zachary O'Brien and Tim Higgins ---- helped Peragine cart the sculpture's segments to the garden and assemble them beneath a towering rubber tree.

"I really like direct light on the piece, and (curator) Naomi Nussbaum had done a really thoughtful job of selecting this particular site," Peragine said. "When you drive up, it's visible from the main entry, and when you come down the path from the other side, it's a little bit more harmonious and the color scheme speaks differently under the trees."

He said the sculpture is especially colorful, with layers of acrylic paint over marine plywood: "I was really stunned when I saw how the light coming through the trees worked on the sculpture," Peragine said.

Not for the faint of heart: If you plan to try your hand at Kyle Lograsso's fundraiser on July 20, be prepared for the fact that you may be out-golfed by a 10-year-old.

After all, Kyle has been swinging the clubs ---- or anything resembling a club ---- since he was a toddler, around the same time his left eye was removed due to a rare form of cancer known as retinoblastoma.

Kyle's latest idea beats all: 100 rounds of golf in a single day to benefit other kids with the disease.

"There's only about 300 to 500 children diagnosed with this in the U.S. every year," said Regina Lograsso, the young golfer's mother and the executive director of Through Kyle's Eyes Foundation. "I never even knew you could get cancer in your eyes ---- didn't know what to look for, didn't know the signs. We wanted to form this organization to support other families who are going through it."

The family lives in Murrieta, and the fundraiser will take place at Legends Golf Club in Temecula on July 20.

Lograsso said that her son, who swings left-handed, has already raised $17,000 in pledges for the event, and that 10 other people have signed up.

"I still tell him every day, 'I don't know if you realize how much 100 holes of golf is,'" she said with a laugh. "But for a kid to take this initiative ---- we want to support it."

Kyle already has 1,500 Twitter followers and has played alongside the likes of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.

Previous golf tournaments hosted by the foundation have yielded as much as $60,000, and the Lograssos are asking this month's entrants to raise at least $1,500 in pledges.

For more information or to sign up for the "Fight Fore Sight 100 Hole Challenge," visit www.kylelograsso.org.