There will be an arts community meeting this coming Monday, January 28 to present some important components of plans for moving forward with the arts in Cochrane. So arts community, please put that date on your calendar and do your best to come and be part of this meeting. The meeting will be at 7 p.m. in the enclosed patio at Half Hitch Brewing Company.
On the agenda will be some discussion about our feedback to the town about the arts and culture projects presently included in the Tri-Site Concept Plan that was presented to the town in December. We will also talk about the upcoming spring arts event and about membership as we prepare for our annual meeting in February.
I will also be sharing some personal thoughts about where I see the arts community going. This past year has been a process for me of getting to know the arts community again after years of being out of the loop. I’m aware that it may seem like not much has been happening that is outwardly visible and that people may feel discouraged about that. But there has been a lot of foundation work done this past year that I believe has been very necessary. It’s not visible, flashy, exciting sort of work. If anything, it’s the tough and hard work of putting in a solid foundation that can then be built on to last. So I’ll be sharing where we are at with that.
I first became part of the arts community here over thirty years ago when I moved here. I am well aware that there are issues here that need to addressed, and there are things we need to work through. But I am also very aware that we have incredible potential here and I see the possibilities for some really amazing things ahead for us as an arts community. I want to share that with you, and start exploring that with you.
So I do hope to see as many of you as possible at the meeting on Monday.
I’ve had two arts meetings in the past several weeks as we’ve started to explore the possibility of creating an arts and culture facility in Cochrane.
The first meeting was with the arts council plus several members of arts organizations and some individual arts members. What came out of that meeting was that we very much wanted to give input to the town regarding the arts and culture component of the Tri-Site Concept Plan. But we simply didn’t know enough about what went into that plan, about why decisions were made, for us to even know where to start with giving feedback.
So last week a group of us from the arts community met with town Coun. Susan Flowers who chaired the Tri-Site Committee, and Gerry Murphy who is the Senior Manager of Community Services – which includes arts and culture.
I came away from that meeting very encouraged with the information we were given, and a lot less stressed about the timeline for all of this.
However, having said that, I am still aware that we as an arts community have a lot of work ahead of us and this is not a time to sit back and rest easy. So if you have any thoughts about what needs to be included in an arts centre, or a wish list of things you would like to see included, then please start writing that down and bring that to the meeting on Monday.
