Vermont's Creative Economy: Progress and Promise

This free comprehensive resource is designed for communities, policy leaders, educators, businesses, and nonprofits who want to learn about what's working, and how the creative economy might fit into their future plans.

Robert McBride, Executive Director of the Rockingham Arts and Museum Project (RAMP) has issued a call to all local artists to attend an Artists Town Meeting on Wednesday, February 27, 2008 from 6 - 8 pm at Boccelli's On the Canal, 46 Canal Street in Bellows Falls. The purpose of the event is to gather local artists for a conversation about the "State of the Arts" in the community and to mobilize people interested in participating in upcoming arts opportunities such as affordable housing and work space, sharing ideas on exhibitions, the Vermont Crafts Council Open Studio Weekend and the annual RAMP Arts Raffle.

"We're excited to present this opportunity for newly arrived and established local artists to meet each other and have a dialogue about the importance of the arts in our community." Says McBride. "There is an ever-growing community of working artists in our midst, all of whom are contributing greatly to the cultural and economic vitality of the area. One of RAMP's many roles is to be an advocate for the arts, and in order to be effective in that role, we seek opportunities to hear from local artists and assist them in making community connections that benefit us all."

The project was underwritten by:

• The Vermont Arts Council
• Preservation Trust of Vermont
• Housing Vermont
• The Vermont Community Foundation

Download brochure

The emphasis of the brochure is to encourage both visitors and residents to visit the downtowns regularly, celebrate their cultural history and participate in the current shopping in order to sustain economic vibrancy. In the words of the text, written by Richard Ewald: "communities still stand in a special relationship to the natural environment, and retain the physical imprint of the era when they were created, when local industries transformed rural villages into urban towns."

While the brochure tells the timeless story of these communities, an insert was designed that is updated seasonally to promote events in the participating communities.

Robert McBride, Director of the Rockingham Arts and Museum Project and Executive Director of the Bellows Falls Downtown Development Alliance is available to come talk to the participating communities and discuss how the brochure can effectively integrated into the marketing strategies of the participating communities. For more information please contact Mr. McBride at 802-463-3252, email: ramp@sover.net.

The brochure was supported by the Southern Vermont Regional Marketing Program, The Connecticut River Joint Commission, Preservation Trust of Vermont, The Vermont Country Store and the Bellows Falls Downtown Development Alliance.

Opening: Monday February 27 4-7pm Please come for appetizers and drinks All are welcome

The Public Table can be found at: 9 Canal Street in downtown Bellows Falls (the Exner Block)

The Public Table is a community based provisional restaurant project presented by the international art and architecture collective spurse. This provisional restaurant will serve free costless cuisine on Fridays and Saturdays at 5pm. And host gleaning/exploratory walks on Monday and Tuesday at 1pm.

The Public Table is an investigation into the generosity and excess of the region. What can be found for free? What do people collect? What does the world provide for us? What is going to waste? Who has something to share? What can be given away? Everything associated with this project has been given to us or gleaned by us.

We welcome all donations of materials related to food and cooking « these could be family recipes or stories, food, cooking supplies, pots, pans, microwaves or the location for fiddlehead ferns or chanterelle mushrooms.

Every week we will be going on random gleaning walks through the region exploring questions relating to food (Mondays and Tuesdays at 1pm).

We welcome the opportunity to host other events relating to food or cooking and the sharing of the cultures of food and cooking (please contact us).

In this manner The Public Table seeks to investigate locality, migrancy, the global movement of resources, and gleaning. We invite people to come for a meal, walks, and to simply stop by to discuss or browse our archives of books and other materials.

For more information about spurse please see spurse.org

Public Art/Moving Site is a traveling presentation of public art that will respond to and be presented in three New England communities. The collaborating Project Partners are: Cambridge Arts Council (CAC) in Cambridge, Massachusetts (www.cambridgeartscouncil.org); Rockingham Arts and Museum Project (RAMP) in Bellows Falls, Vermont (www.ramp-vt.org); and Artspace in New Haven, Connecticut (www.artspacenh.org) have had extensive experience bringing visual and performing arts to diverse neighborhoods, serving those who are not normally part of the traditional audience for artistic presentations.

The City of Cambridge, the Village of Bellows Falls, and the City of New Haven all grew up along rivers and were shaped by the industrial past of New England. While sharing common threads of geography and history, each town has developed a unique character determined by a combination of social, physical, and historical influences. Public art responds to these influences and offers metaphors for enriching the life of a community.

Working with a NEFA Planning Grant, project partners developed an innovative public art project that would stretch the concept of “site”. Public Art/Moving Site defines site as both stationary and moving. Project artists will respond to the characteristics of each location as well as the journey the art will take. Each artwork/performance/exhibition will retain its integrity while accumulating the experience of its residency in Cambridge, New Haven, and Bellows Falls.

In Phase One of this project RAMP will develop the ground floor of the building into two working studio spaces to be rented to local artists.

In Phase Two of the project, RAMP will develop the upstairs into an artist's residency program which provides living and work space.

RAMP conceptualized the mural as a way to welcome visitors to Bellows Falls and to celebrate the past and present. This timely project complements the Exner Block renovation, the Vermont Downtown Designation and symbolizes the renaissance of the town.

Muralists, Cliff Clear and Bonnie Lee Turner from The Art of Life (Lincoln, Rhode Island) painted the mural using historical photographs obtained from the Rockingham Free Public Library. Sign-maker Frank Hawkins, of Bellows Falls, created the lettering style for the greeting, "Welcome to Bellows Falls" which will be added at a later date.

The $17,000 project has been funded in part by:

• a Municipal Arts Grant from the Vermont Arts Council
• Windham Foundation
• Vermont Community Foundation
• and the Town of Rockingham.

Corporate leaders ($1000 or more) included:

• First Vermont Bank
• the Vermont Country Store
• Buffum's Supermarket
• and Ben & Jerry's.

In addition, several individual contributions from supporters of the arts made this project possible.

Bellows Falls, situated on the Connecticut River, was once a prosperous mill town, and Canal Street held the bustling activity of shopkeepers who operated stores at street level and lived above them.

But when economic time grew hard, Exner Block merchants had to close their doors. The second and third floors were occupied by Mary Exner, whose eccentricities rivaled those of famed Bellows Falls resident Hetty Green, known as the "witch of Wall Streer" and once the richest woman in the world. For years, Exner lived alone in the vast building with her dog, rambling from room to room.

When she passed away several years ago, the edifice sat empty. A number of plans for its future ran the gamut from limited efforts at restoration to possible razing for a parking lot.

On October 7th, 1998, Housing Vermont successfully bid at auction on the Exner Block. RAMP worked along with Housing Vermont to move this project forward.

Owner:

• Exner Block Housing Limited Partnership

• Housing Vermont
• Rockingham Areas Community Land Trust

• First Vermont Bank
• Chittenden Bank

• Town of Rockingham & Village of Bellows Falls through VT Community Development Board
• VT Housing & Conservation Board
• US Dept. of Housing and Urban Development
• VT Housing Finance Agency through the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program

• Williams & Frehsee, Inc.

• Wesfield Construction Company, Inc.

• Rockingham Arts & Museum Project (RAMP)

• The Exner Block collaboration with Housing Vermont and The Rockingham Area Community Land Trust created ten, affordable live/work spaces for artists and six retail spaces with a focus on the arts.
• The historic mural project greeting people to the downtown.
• Public Art Moving Site, initiating a dilogue about about art amongst the communities of Bellows Falls, New Haven, CT and Cambridge, MA
• From Mills to Main Streets linking Bellows Falls with seven other communtities along the Connecicut River National Byway through the story of their industrial history.
• RAMP's participation by serving on a variety of boards including: The National Trust for Historic Preservation, Preservation Trust of Vermont, Connecticut River National Byway Council, Main Street Arts and Great River Arts