Clockwise from top left: (1) public map of DownStreet Art locations; (2) street signage; (3) “Beyond the Blue Mountains,” film by Mollie Davies, Artery Gallery; (4) entrance to William Oberst Studio; (5) pavement markings (All Images: VanierNow, 2012)
Exploring the old commercial hub of North Adams, Massachusetts, earlier this summer, it was hard not to draw certain inspiration. In the core of this former industrial city and mill town, set in the Berkshire Hills of western Massachusetts, we were able to view Jarvis Rockwell’s toy installation (below), experimental film and activist art used in the Occupy Movement, and see a working traditional letterpress (run collectively) – all for free – all in former commercial mainstreet storefronts that had gone vacant when industry left.
The arts exhibits are all part of DownStreet Art (DSA), a public art initiative, founded in 2008, that is today transforming downtown North Adams. Today, DSA brings visual and performing arts, exhibitions, film screenings and site-specific installations to this old downtown. And the town’s vacant commercial storefronts have served as host sites for many of the temporary (or, pop-up) summer galleries, all with the permission of property owners – with some becoming converted into permanent gallery spaces. To be sure, the festival is aided by the presence in town of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), which was established in 1999 in the sprawling site of the former Arnold Print Works, a major producer of printed textiles in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. But the local flavour of DSA stands apart from MASS MoCA, too.
The initiative is a program of the Berkshire Cultural Resource Center, a non-profit organization run through the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, today providing professional development and support to artists and arts professional – and building a local creative economy. In North Adams, local business owner Keith Bona explains, DownStreet Art is “making empty store fronts and bland walls attractive and inviting.”
Toy pyramid installation by Jarvis Rockwell, Jarvis Rockwell Gallery (Image: VanierNow, 2012)
It goes without saying that today’s vacant storefronts and spaces on Montreal Road and Beechwood Avenue present opportunities. So, are there property owners interested in working with community partners to find creative reuse of these vacant spaces – even for a short time? The North Adams experience suggests that even temporary uses of space have enabled the community to experiment with new ideas, instil local confidence, promote local economic development and draw others to town. There are other examples, too. The Made in Sterling shop, in Stirling, UK, aims to showcase the work of local artists in a vacant storefront on the traditional highstreet. In a more suburban setting, the Service Center for Contemporary Culture and Community, established in an abandoned tire shop in Indianapolis, has created space for community-driven arts, fitness and skills development spaces.
So, as a community, what visions might we have for our traditional mainstreets? Spaces for the arts or film screenings? A used bookshop? A community-driven pop-up café? A space for training and development? A single space that might flexibly enable all of the above? How might we make possible the reuse of vacant space – even one storefront at a time?
(Mike Bulthuis)
