“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances … ,” the Bard of Avon, otherwise known as William Shakespeare, once wrote. With its new state cultural district designation, Greenfield wants to bring new audiences to its stage — downtown.
The Massachusetts Cultural Council tapped Greenfield’s downtown for its Crossroads Cultural District designation, the 35th time the state has made such an award since the initiative was instituted five years ago.
The idea behind the Crossroads Cultural District is to make the public more aware of the community’s creative sector — the arts, humanities and science — as an economic engine and as a means of enhancing community life.
“One of the most powerful things that we’ve discovered about our cultural district program is it brings people together who share a vision around what their community can be,” Anita Walker, executive director of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, said. “So that’s exactly what happened in Greenfield. There was so much enthusiasm from the mayor to the artists to the shopkeepers to the people who live here.”
Through the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the community can take advantage of a number of resources to help get the word out about what people can find here, as well as the development of cultural economic development strategies, artist living and working space and the planning and construction of cultural facilities.
This means drawing on the services of a number of different agencies and organizations, besides the Mass. Cultural Council. The list ranges from Mass. Humanities and the Department of Conservation and Recreation to the state Office of Business Development and Office of Travel and Tourism. They and others provide openings to programs and financial assistance that can only help to benefit what communities are doing.
And in the view of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, there’s something exciting happening in Greenfield.
Walker said the first thing she looks for when visiting a community during the application process is whether it has an engaged group of people who have a vision and a plan, and that’s exactly what she found in Greenfield.
“We absolutely were smitten. We all wanted to move there … It was just this hidden gem. I had never been there, and when we started walking around, behind every door there was something so special. Everything from the galleries to just the creative way people thought about the use of space,” Walker said. “People really want to make it special.”
Of course that’s no secret to the many people in Greenfield and neighboring towns. From the businesses to residents to officials, there is an active interest in having a welcoming community that is a vibrant home to the arts. As Mayor William Martin pointed out, “We’re doing things that create a huge sense of independence and a huge basis of sustainability, but what we’re really missing is the stage, and this Crossroads Cultural District is going to be our stage.”
And it’s a stage that can put Greenfield on the map for years to come.
Bravo.