Artomatic starts Friday

Artomatic, the free-form temporary arts space that lasts for about one month, located in spaces around the area that are about to be demolished or not quite ready for leasing, is launching again this Friday, once again in Crystal City, in Arlington, Virginia, at 1851 S. Bell Street.

(Next time, I might get it together to do a display on cultural planning and discipline specific arts planning, the development of arts districts, etc.  I think the opportunity to push discourse forward on arts policy isn't taken up by the Artscape initiative, and it's a lost opportunity.  Although maybe there is still time to do a forum on the topic as part of the overall program.)

Interesting businesses/markets/operations: ideas for revitalization export

Made by DWC cafe in Los Angeles. Image from Good Magazine, "A New Cafe on L.A.'s Skid Row Serves Crafts, Coffee, and Community."

-- Huntington Beach, California's "Surf City Nights" includes a night-time farmers market. I've suggested such for DC's Eastern Market for years. (There are plenty of such examples across the country.)

-- Brooklyn has an occasional Night Bazaar as well.

-- Local Roots Market & Cafe in Wooster, Ohio is a co-op but I think of it more as a conglomerator, selling foods produced locally, but not requiring each farmer to set up stands at a farmers market.

Actually, more of these kind of "local food hubs" are being created across the county, in places like Charlottesville, VA and Phoenix, Arizona, among others.

-- Venezuela's El Sistema classical music education program sponsors a variety of programs across the country and has produced talents active on the international scene. See "Venerated High Priest and Humble Servant of Music Education" from the New York Times.

Although DC's Washington National Opera is doing some local programs too, such as their "in your neighborhood" program which has delivered a number of concerts and related activities in the Columbia Heights neighborhood.

-- The Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver has the "Art Fitness Training" program, which teaches art appreciation. The Utah Museum of Contemporary Art has a similar program. See "Art fitness training helps with understanding contemporary art" from the Salt Lake City Deseret News.

-- Made by DWC (the Downtown Women's Center) is a gift shop and cafe on Skid Row in Los Angeles (and last year they had popup shops elsewhere in the city during the holidays). It's a job training program, a revenue producer for the nonprofit, and a place where DWC clients can sell goods that they produce. (Article from Good Magazine.)

From the Good Magazine article:

The DWC's social enterprise program was started five years ago to help the center's women develop business principles, a sense of social responsibility, and environmental awareness, says Annah Mason, social enterprise coordinator. Workshops taught by local artists and designers, like social design group Project H, help teach the women valuable skills and give them a creative outlet. In addition to creating the products, DWC women do the store's merchandising and inventory, thanks to training from Bloomingdale's Century City location. "They have work experience, they've just been disconnected," says Mason of the women at DWC. "It's amazing to see the light come back."

The store itself was designed by David Magid and takes advantage of the huge, loft-like windows and extra-high ceilings that flood the space with light. Attractively arranged among the creations by DWC's women are other items including housewares, stationary sets, craft books, and even antiques—all donations, says Mason. They're still looking for more donations, including products that will fit the boutique's DIY-market-meets-hip-thrift-store theme. In fact, she'll gladly take your grandmother's china that's gathering dust in the basement. "If you feel sentimental about something but don't need it anymore, we will turn it into something," she says.

This is the kind of shop I had in mind when I wrote about the hullaballoo over the Calvary Woman's Services debacle in Anacostia, where people fighting the homeless program looking to locate a facility there--over two arguments, one on overconcentration, the other on a nonretail use in a commercial district desperate for more retail uses--could have at least some of their concerns assuaged, if the homeless program would build retail activities into their program, just like the DWC in Los Angeles. (Although there are other examples.)

-- Similarly, there are a bunch of good examples of craft stores selling regionally produced items--something that I suggested should be part of the retail at the building constructed on the Hine site, adjacent to DC's Eastern Market in this blog entry, "Art & Invention Gallery as a retail prototype for a store in the Eastern Market area," including Heartwood in Abingdon, Virginia, the Illinois Artisans Shop, state run, in a government building in Chicago, the Mississippi Crafts Center Gallery in Ridgeland, Mississippi, the Art Studios at Spanish Village Art Center in San Diego, the Center for Maine Craft Gallery in West Gardiner, Maine, and the South Carolina Artisans Center near Charleston.

Art & Invention Gallery as a retail prototype for a store in the Eastern Market area

Image: Nashville Art & Invention Gallery.

So #1, DC's Eastern Market has weekend crafts and artists vendors selling their wares.

So #2, the Eastern Market area is comparatively "dead" during the week, even though the Market building is open Tuesday to Friday as well, from 7am to 7pm.

While night-time farmers markets at least one day of the week aren't unusual (e.g., the NoMA district has an early evening farmers market on Wednesdays and there is a Tuesday evening market in Brookland near the Metro Station, etc.), it would be nice to have a night market one evening per week at Eastern Market, but this is difficult to do for many reasons, including the fact that the market is surrounded by residences.

-- Brooklyn Night Bazaar, Williamsburg, Brooklyn

-- Surf City Nights, Huntington Beach, California

So #3, the old Hine Junior High School site is being redeveloped into a mixed use project.

So #4, why not have one of the retail businesses in there be something like the Art & Invention Gallery in East Nashville?

It's a gallery space that sells art and crafts items by local artists and artisans. They have shows and workshops.

It would leverage the existing weekend art and crafts vending by having a more permanent 7 day presence in a brick and mortar shop and could be set up as a co-operative type operation as well, as a part of both Eastern Market and maybe other arts-related organizations in the area including the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop and maybe the Hill Center.

It could develop arts entrepreneurship and training programs (MICA certificate program in "The Business of Art and Design") and be an arts-business related incubator, leveraging and extending the ability of outdoor markets to promote business development.

See this webpage "Measuring the Impact of Public Markets and Farmers Markets on Local Economies" and the report, Public Markets as a Vehicle for Social Integration and Upward Mobility from Project for Public Spaces for resources.