Building community and economy through art
In the Upper Minnesota River Valley, folks have been gathering to talk about what they want to see happen in their area. Several listening sessions have been held to ask, "What can we do together that makes life more sustainable here?"
Art, art, art. It keeps coming up. Celebrate the people and place and generate more life and action down on Main Street, along the river and in the countryside.
These listening sessions use what's called Open Space technology, which in essence means everyday people suggest projects and topics of interest and other participants who want to explore that idea and collaborate, join in. From there, things happen. And these people get it done. Momentum grows.
In Granite Falls, the sixth graders from Bert Raney Elementary School identified that they wanted to build art bike racks and encourage folks to bike around town and down to Prentice Street for some popcorn.
Another art teacher, Tamara Isfeld, suggested they start a Drop-In Art Night at a new community building where folks can stop in, make and see art, play music and hang out in this new space on Main Street.
Next up, a mosaic wall—created by the community—on the exterior of this K.K. Berge building for the people in the park and on the river to enjoy as they walk or paddle by.
Art draws people together. It celebrates local talent and culture, and helps generate business. In Granite Falls, they check out the local art in the new art and vintage store on Prentice Street, in the K.K. Berge building, and in the studios nearby.
Local folks are not the only ones coming to see it. This has been true for nine years in the case of the Meander—a regional art crawl throughout the scenic landscape of the Upper Minnesota River Valley. Every year more people from the Twin Cities and surrounding areas come to roam along fields of haystacks, rows of crops and a meandering river to visit art studios showcasing beautiful art and live music.
This year at the Meander, more than $94,000 was earned for rural artists throughout the region who opened their studios. The area's B&Bs and overnight venues benefitted as well.
Cultural exchanges happen and relationships build. And ideas click, with folks learning and exploring the region and workable ideas to perhaps try out in their own community to help spur things there as well.
Here, leadership comes from the ground up—from the sixth graders at Bert Raney Elementary School, to the artists across five counties celebrating the spirit of western Minnesota.
Comments
The Formula is Straightforward
Creative people collaborating together create excitement. Excitement is an ingredient of hope and hope is the most basic necessary ingredient for economic growth.
Through her photos, videos and writings, Anne Queenan has been capturing the palpable excitement of Upper Minnesota rivertowns as artists and creative people step, make connections.
Connections between each other, connections between chambers of commerce and business people, connections between artists and other creative people from outside the region.
Boring is not normal, nor should it be tolerated any longer. Let's continue to unleash creative power -- remove the dams of fear and constriction and judgement and lets flow boldly forward to new positive futures!
Arts and Economic Development
The Upper Minnesota River Valley Art Meander is becoming an autumn tradition for me. Anne has captured the great spirit of the place and the people. The artists open their hearts and studios to share their stunning work, the gatherings at the K.K. Berge building in Granite Falls remind us of the importance of community celebrations and the friendships I'm developing there keep me coming back for more! The river valley sings with natural and cultural beauty. Put it on your calender for October, 2013.
Art and Community Development
The Meander story is just the tip of a very big iceberg. Throughout Minnesota we are seeing, more and more artists and arts organizations working as active participants in the development of caring, capable and sustainable communities. These creators see their work and their roles as part of a cultural ecosystem that can only thrive when it is woven into the broader fabric of community life.
Two examples, both Bush supported, stand out.
The first is the Pillsbury House Neighborhood Center, in
Minneapolis. Pillsbury House Theatre and Pillsbury House
Neighborhood Center have been located in the same building for the
past 17 years. During this time, they have share both resource and
community outreach efforts to their mutual benefit. Recently, Pillsbury
has committed itself to more deeply integrating cultural practice into
its community building efforts. To accomplish this, they have merged
the Theatre program and the Pillsbury House Neighborhood Center,
and placing them under the leadership of the Theatre’s Co-Artistic
Directors, Noel Raymond, and Faye Price. The long-term goal for this
amalgamation is to develop a cultural community hub that will
become “a new model for nonprofit human service work that
recognizes the power of the arts and culture to stimulate community
participation, investment and ownership. This new model which has
been underway for the last year extends these reciprocal relationships
to full collaboration. This means that human and health services are
becoming a primary gateway through which individuals access the
theatre, and the theatre will be a catalyst that creates opportunities for
personal advancement and community development. It’s important to
keep in mind that the extraordinary theater work happening at
Pillsbury House feeds off of its relationships with the Centers
constituents and surrounding neighbors. They are regularly
recognized as one of the most inventive and powerful company’s in
the Midwest.
The Center is also creating a comprehensive, creative community
development program to strengthen and build “creative clusters” as a way to help fulfill community-building goals in the Powderhorn-
Central neighborhood. This goal is informed, and guided by research
conducted by Susan Seifert and Mark Stern, at the University of
Pennsylvania’s Social Impact of the Arts Project (SIAP). SIAP’s
research shows that neighborhoods with very dense, highly interactive
networks of artists and arts organizations produce specific benefits for
those communities. These benefits include poverty
reduction, population retention and growth and increased civic
participation. They postulate that the power of culture derives, in part,
from the dynamic social networks it creates, particularly among active
cultural participants. They also say that the presence of cultural
organizations produces high levels of “cross-participation” in a
neighborhood that stimulates residents’ involvement in other civic
activities.
The other example is the Creative Community Leadership Institute (CCLI) run by Intermedia Arts in Minneapolis.It's a rigorous 5-month training for artists, social service professionals, community organizers. policy makers and educators that has been operating since 2002. All told 120 graduates from the program are working in neighborhood organizations, at-risk schools, prisons, homeless shelters, hospices, labor unions, community centers, jobs programs, and daycare facilities. These graduates are now recognized as a transformational force in the both the St. Louis and Twin Cities area with many in positions of cultural, community development and political leadership.
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