North Adams: Where Past Meets Present

 

Facilitated through Art About Town and partnered with DownStreet Art's Public Art Mural Project and the City of North Adams, art teacher Christina King was ready to push her ideas and after school program, CAMP (Community Art Mural Project), into motion. This would involve her Greylock Elementary School students, the assistance of local artist, William Oberst, and I to recreate Arnold Printworks onto the pillars under the Veterans Memorial Bridge on Marshall Street.

 

In keeping up with the community aspect, the Arnold Printworks were the selected images for the pillars because of the relation they had to North Adams. The selection of images were from the cut-and-stitch cloth dolls printed by Arnold Printworks from the late 1890’s through 1910. Arnold Printworks (1862-1945) was located on the present-day site of Mass MoCA and by 1905 was one of the world’s leading producers of printed textiles.

 

In the summer of 2013, we took the same project to the other side of the street with Mill Children and painted images of the young children who worked in the mills.

 

I am grateful to have been apart of this creative art process and being able to work with those on this project. Being able to help move his project to a finish stage is a great accomplishment. I am excited for the day when more murals become apart of the community and will be eagerly ready to help bring them to life.