Hurrah! I had two people call me up after they read my March article and they both told me they were interested in helping with the idea of SCV having an Art Center. Well of course this made me very happy and I met these two people. One was a man and the other a woman. They both live in Santa Clarita and are very interested in the arts having a permanent home in Santa Clarita. I talked with these two people and we discussed, “What is art?” and, “How do the arts work in our SCV community?”
All of these questions are questions we will pursue in getting more people involved in being a group who also want an Art Center to be built. Of course the question is? Why have an arts center? To begin we must remember that the fundamental value of the arts is to acknowledge the incredible economic impact of the nonprofit arts and how the arts foster beauty, creativity, originality, and vitality. Every day we are surrounded by the art designs we see in our homes, city, buildings, malls, businesses and the achievements of human experience. The basic needs of people are understanding expression and communication and all of the arts provide these two types of needs.
Life itself is a work of art. Yes, at first though to see an art center be created seems like an impossible task, but when a group of people all work towards this goal and have the policymakers help to create an ‘art center plan,’ we will begin to strengthen the idea of an art center as a very necessary part of the lives of the community here in Santa Clarita. When new city council members are elected the advocacy group will work to have their support and help in capitalizing on the creative economy’s potential of the ‘arts’ in a central art center building.
A city owned Art Center will address connections between economic growth, boost tourism, and increase the understandings of the” importance of the arts” in our lives every day.
Call me and tell me you want to be part of the ‘art center’ group. Jaylene Armstrong is a retired art educator from Madison, Wisconsin. For more information, please call 661-255-3050.