March 10: Round 2 of the Carrboro Arts & Creativity District planning process

Here's the invite, open to all interested in the arts in Carrboro, Chapel Hill and the Triangle:

“What Makes a Great Creativity District?”, the second in a series of open community meetings about the proposed Carrboro Arts & Creativity District, will take place at The ArtsCenter, 300-G East Main St, from 6:30 until 7:30 PM on Monday, March 10. 

After a brief presentation highlighting features of outstanding arts and cultural districts in other towns, anyone attending the session will be invited to share his or her ideas and questions about the proposed district currently under consideration for Carrboro.  

The public is welcome and there is no charge for admission. 

FOR MORE INFORMATION: Anita Jones-McNair, Carrboro Recreation & Parks Dept. (919-918-7381, amcnair@townofcarrboro.org, or Art Menius, The ArtsCenter (919-929-2787x217, director@artscenterlive.org)

No need to register ahead of time...just show up!

Building the future of the Arts in Carrboro public meeting tonight!

Building the future of the Arts in Carrboro: Public meeting this Thursday, Jan. 16th
6:00pm at The Century Center

Join us this Thursday, January 16th at 6:00pm at The Century Center to discuss the development of the Arts in Carrboro and the planning of our future Arts District. This meeting is free and open to the public. Come with feedback, questions, ideas, or simply to listen and learn. Public involvement is what drives this process. Come out and get involved in the future of Carrboro!

The 300 E. Main St Hampton Inn groundbreaking

The long awaited groundbreaking for the much anticipated Carrboro hotel will happen on March 28th at 11am at 300 E. Main St. From my invite:

Main Street Properties of Chapel  Hill LLC and the Atma Hotel Group are partnering on 300 East Main’s first phase, which will include Orange County’s first LEED-certified hotel and 18,000 square feet of ground-floor retail/restaurant space facing Main Street, plus a 500-space parking deck with public parking.

So why does the Carrboro Art Scene blog care?  Our hope is that, along with the Town of Carrboro's Arts Committee of which I am the chair, we will be able to gain a commitment that the hotel feature local arts and sculpture. What could be better than a Mike Roig sculpture outside or a large Steven Silverleaf collage in the lobby? Or even a lowly Chris Beacham in one of the cheap rooms? Let's have some of our other Orange and Chatham County, and Chapel Hill artists there too.  Heck let's bring that Triad breath of fresh air Saxapahaw along too.

The conceptual drawing from the groundbreaking invite

Carrack Gallery Kickstarter update!

As of today the Carrack Gallery Kickstarter campaign has 194 backers for a total of $12,200. In other words, they made it! There is still some time (till Saturday) to add to the total and help the gallery out even more.

Periodic artist apportunities from the NC Arts Council

The NC Arts newsletters are a great way to keep up with opportunities for all kinds of artists.  Check back often.

Arts vanity license plates

From the Orange County Arts Commission:

ARTS SPECIALTY LICENSE PLATE. Help support Arts North Carolina by purchasing a specialty license plate! $20 of every plate sold goes to Arts North Carolina “to promote the arts” each year the plate is renewed. $10 of every plate sold goes back to North Carolina for the wildflower program, tourism, and welcome center accessibility. Cost: $30 in addition to your yearly car registration; $20 tax-deductible as a charitable donation. For more information please visit http://www.artsnc.org/support-join/license-plate/

 For me that would require that I actually have a car!

From Andrew T. on Flickr

The arts are not free!

The arts are always an easy mark when the government needs/wants to reduce spending.  Now when health, roads,  and schools are facing drastic cuts the arts are even under greater attack.  Here are a couple of articles that describe what is likely to the happen in NC if those in power in the legislature have their way:

The News & Observer
The Charlotte Observer

Do what you can.

Another arts venue???

From the News & Observer Campus Notes Blog. Hmmm?? The idea is to have the old Chapel Hill Museum building at 523 E. Franklin St. become a joint UNC-CH-Town of Chapel Hill space for art and art events.  The blog post includes the UNC-CH proposal by Distinguished Professor of Art elin o'Hara slavik which begins:

523 East Franklin will be named CHART to be able to promote, brand and support the space as a location to be visited. It will be a collaborative project space between the town of Chapel Hill (Jeff York, Public Arts Administrator) and UNC’s Art Department (Professor elin o’Hara slavick), with a 3-year renewable contract/lease with an "out clause" for both parties.

Keeping up with artist opportunities

From the NC Arts Council on keeping up with artist opportunities:

The N.C. Arts Council is pleased to share the following opportunities for artists that have recently been submitted to us. Please contact the organization listed if you have any questions.

 The Arts Council does not endorse or recommend any specific opportunities, but provides this list for information only. We encourage artists to research each opportunity thoroughly before applying. Artist opportunities may be submitted to jennifer.huggins@ncdcr.gov.

Following North Carolina arts issues

ARTS North Carolina is the group you need to know about if you want to keep up with arts advocacy and politics (funding, arts programs, museums, etc.)   Here's who they are:

We are North Carolina’s statewide advocacy organization for the arts. ARTS North Carolina calls for equity and access to the arts for all North Carolinians, unifies and connects North Carolina’s arts communities, and fosters arts leadership. We speak for the arts wherever there is need.

 You can keep up using their various web activities:

Main web page
Facebook page
Their blog
and Twitter!

FRANK opening in downtown Chapel Hill!

Chapel Hill's new community non-profit art collective will open on April 9th during the 2ndFriday Art Walk.  There is not much yet on their website but put it on your calendar.  I'm hoping this a great opportunity to liven up the Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Triangle art scene.  I also can see it positively improving the  economic impact of arts in the local community and putting more money in the pockets of working artists.

Carrboro Art: where next?

The recent events surrounding the exciting Franklin Street Artist Collective have gotten me thinking. What about Carrboro? I know that Carrboro artists can apply to be in the Collective but I'm talking about a lively art scene here in the Paris of the Piedmont.

So any ideas? For example, how do we liven up the 2ndFriday Art Walk? We've lost a couple of places that used to be open such as Jessie Kalisher. Traffic is a little hit and miss. I think I'll propose that the Town Art Committee do a little survey of the downtown merchants and organizations who are on the tour and also those who have dropped off.

What about other issues such as inexpensive studio space, public art, mixing visual art with other media? We're creative, let's use that energy!

Chapel Hill Franklin Street Art Collective materials

Karen and I attended the public meeting at the Chapel Hill Town Hall for the proposed Franklin Street Art Collective. I was fairly impressed with the homework they had done and the balanced view they took. I haven't examined the business plan yet but they seem to be using conservative financial assumptions -- a good thing. Amazingly enough they hope to be open by November!

Details (including the presentation, business plan and artist application) can be found here on the Town website but here are a few details:

- 30-40 artists in the collective who put up $500 to start, $20 month and pay a 25% commission on sales. Members are expected to work 6-8 hours month and make a 2 year commitment.
- An undetermined number of consignment artists can show their work but will pay a 50% commission.
- Artists can apply for both membership and consignment at the same time.
- Both categories will be juried and none of the those judging are involved in the collective.
- The application says that you must live within a 25 mile radius of Chapel Hill but I do not believe that is a hard and fast rule.
- They continually harped on wanting to have the highest quality art.
- Michael Brader-Araje, the building's owner, is a hero!

Good for Raleigh!

In tight budget times the arts generally takes a big hit. Our souls -- young and old -- need art and beauty but feeding souls seem to be of minor importance. Somehow we see arts as optional, quite an odd view given the increasing importance of creativity, design and arts in being competitive in the world economy.

So hurrahs to Raleigh for refusing to slash arts funding this year.