This is traditionally the time of the year that we reflect on the one just past, and plan for the coming one. Despite all the challenges that we were hit with in 2021, we are buoyed by the fact that the arts make everything better.
We are home to the arts, and the host of many opportunities to be creative, expressive, and skilled in a chosen artistic discipline.
Here are our resolutions for the coming year. Let's go 2022!
1.) Be bold!
We are flush with new energy, new ideas, new staff. In 2021 we are planning new classes, trying out new ideas, and pushing ourselves outside our comfort zone.
We invite you to do the same through one of our
classes -
- try an adult dance class, theatre class, or ceramics class
- try a different medium such as creating with recycled materials,
- pick up the piano again and take some lessons
- kickstart that book that you always wanted to write with our new online writers' workshop this winter
- sign your elementary schooler up for a Tuesday creative arts class,
- or your teen for a ceramics sculpture class.
2.) Be prepared
We feel like CDC groupies after our nearly two-year vigilance to help keep staff and students safe and to create responsive policies, and we will continue to prepare ourselves with the latest information and data. We are planning initiatives to make the building a more welcoming space and to bring about more community programs and public art, and this year we are digging into new grant opportunities to help fund these. Our Finance Committee meets monthly to keep an eye on our finances and to recommend responsible actions to keep us prospering and sustainable. This capable team and our fundraising committee help us to stay prepared financially as we continue to move through this pandemic wave.
3.) Be inclusive
Being a place that is welcoming to all is important to us, but easier said than done. We have initiated work around the building to bring it into ADA compliance, and are simultaneously working through plans and regulations for a three-story elevator. We also recognize that our students have a mix of varied learning styles and we are working to better orient our arts teachers about these needs.
4.) Be inspiring
We continue to be a place for cross-pollination of the arts, and a gathering place for like-minded people in a class, workshop, or networking event. All our schools work to bring our community talented teachers to engage and build our skills and awareness. This year we will also be bringing Lexington more public art, such as we saw last winter with the giant words and painted posts, and this year with a town-wide Fairy Homes project in May. In 2020 we will be striving to amplify these things.
5.) Be nurturing
In all these things we mention here, we work to provide a welcoming and safe community space to learn & grow, to find achievement, & exploration. We strive to create a place where people can come to find artistic nourishment. This season, many staff continue a hybrid online-onsite work schedule. They continue to be dedicated, hard-working and the leaders in nurturing our community whether in person or remotely.
This past year our Board of Directors clarified our mission, which echos these resolutions: To inspire, engage, and nurture our students, artists, audiences, and community in their creative explorations. And from tip to tail, we resolve to do our best in being the community arts center that does just that.
