Mazel Tov to a cherished arts museum
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| Artist Mary Wojciechowski of Attleboro creates luminaries at the Feb. 18 museum art exhibit. |
The Attleboro Arts Museum, which serves the greater Attleboro, MA, area and
beyond, is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, and that’s a
most notable accomplishment.
The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro, MA, saluted that anniversary with stories in
the paper on the weekend of April 8-9, and with this column, which was
published in the edition of Monday, April 10.
At the end of this column, I include the links to the stories and this column in case you’d
like to check them out.
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“Mazel tov” is the traditional Hebrew greeting when you wish someone well as
they’re celebrating a “simcha” (a happy occasion). It’s most often uttered when
wishing people well at milestone events --- bar or bat mitzvahs, marriages, births,
wedding anniversaries, graduations and birthdays.
It literally means good luck as “mazel” means fortune or luck and “tov” means
good.
But however you say it, in whatever language, a most hearty congratulations is
due the Attleboro Arts Museum, which this year is marking its centennial.
It’s a well-deserved anniversary for a cherished Attleboro institution.
In separate stories this weekend, veteran Sun Chronicle Staff Writer George
Rhodes examines the history of the museum and I’ve penned several mini-profiles
of some of the artists who call the museum home. Those artists all credit the
museum for nurturing their art, and for being a supportive place for them to
thrive.
But the museum is much more than a place to display art; it’s a living,
breathing organism and a vital part of the community --- the record crowds that
jammed the museum for the 25th anniversary Flower Show for four days
in late March was just the latest testament to how the museum helps make Attleboro much more than a
city of people, but one of caring individuals.
That’s because the museum has always played a vital role in community outreach,
something that I’ve had the privilege of discovering firsthand twice in the
last three years due to its partnership with the Relay For Life of Greater
Attleboro.
The museum, starting with Executive Director and Chief Curator Mim Brooks
Fawcett and continuing to her creative and caring staff, embraced the
partnership with the relay, which has been raising money for the American
Cancer Society for 25 years.
In 2020, before the pandemic, the museum organized a week-long exhibit,
“Luminaria,” which featured exquisite and beautiful luminaria --- lit at the
relay in honor of cancer survivors and in memory of cancer victims --- created
by nearly two-dozen museum artists.
Three years later, in mid-February, on the day of the Winter Night Festival’s
return to downtown Attleboro, the museum and the relay presented “Creating
Awareness,” an exhibit featuring about a dozen artists decorating luminaria
bags in their chosen mediums.
The role that the museum plays in the community, however, starts with serving
as an outlet for creativity for everyone in the greater Attleboro area and
beyond. Exhibit No. 1 is the classes that it offers, starting with those for
kids all the way through senior citizens, including people in their 80s and
90s. The largest number of people taking
classes are in the K-12 and senior citizen groups, Fawcett said.
In addition, Fawcett said the museum offers “classes for special and
underserved groups.” As examples, she pointed to classes for individuals with
developmental disabilities and to the museum’s “memory café” classes for its
older patrons with memory challenges.
The museum, she said, offers 45-50 classes in winter, spring and fall, and more
are added in the summer, when eight week-long classes for students in
kindergarten through grade 3 or grades 4-8 are offered in addition to ceramics
classes for teens and adults.
Fawcett, who has been leading the museum since 2006, said she’s inspired by the
artists.
“The artists and the level of creativity that I see coming through at all
levels of artists --- emerging or professional --- absolutely fuels what I do
each day,” she said.
She remembers one particular show, when she asked for portraits of people who
left an indelible impression on the artist, and one artist’s tribute to her
grandmother included her dressed in a collar decorated with piano keys, to
emphasize her loved one’s musical talent. “I’m always impressed how an artist
can synthesize their memories and create an uncommon visual,” Fawcett said.
That’s an example, she said, of what excites her in her daily work: the ability
of one request for submissions for a particular exhibition to elicit a
cornucopia of responses. “We all process things in our own way,” she added.
Or, to put it another way, if you move the artist, you’ll move the public.
And that’s something that the museum has been doing for 100 years and hopes to
do for another 100.
Mazel Tov, indeed!
Larry Kessler, a retired Sun Chronicle local news editor, can
be reached at larrythek65@gmail.com. He blogs at larrytheklineup.blogspot.com
STORY LINKS:
Link to George Rhodes' story on the history of
the Attleboro Arts Museum:
https://www.thesunchronicle.
Link to Larry Kessler's stories on the artists at the museum (when you
call them up with this link, you will get the introduction to all eight
artists, whose individual stories are featured on the left side, and you can
click on each one).
https://www.thesunchronicle.
Here's the link to the museum's 100th
anniversary column published Monday, April 10:
https://www.thesunchronicle.
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