Also in November a Contra Costa Times print headline "Downtown Martinez Suffers Another Blow" ran.
Months back I mentioned being on the General Plan Update Task force for the City of Martinez and I envisioned using this space to chronicle the process. Lots has happened since that I wont get into, the most significant was a hospice referral for my mother in July and her death in October. Life has a way of interfering. But I'm more than three quarters of the way back in the saddle with a brain no longer looking for ways to fix my mom. Because that's who I am at my core, a problem solver.
In my last post I mention two of David Meerman Scott's books, it was in The New Rules of Marketing & PR that I was introduced to National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). I looked them up on Twitter and Facebook and added them to my information network. That's how I ran across Kaid Benfield's blog post, Arts-driven revitalization in Kentucky and as I read through it and Kiad's links to the National Endowment for the Arts and The Mayors’ Institute on Community Design , synapses began firing.
The City of Martinez already has a diverse artistic community; actors, filmmakers, writers, musicians, painters, sculptors, dancers, graphic designers, glass blowers and the list goes on. If I'm reading this correctly, and my intiution tells me I am, the City of Martinez is already positioned for it's long over due renaissance.
I'll sign off for now with this last bit: there are a whole lot of but fors in this story; I don't believe in coincidence...
I can't "like" this enough. Martinez has the potential to be so "cool". There is no reason it shouldn't happen in a town that is FILLED with artistic talent in every medium one could think of. My friend, Ed May, who just displayed his work at Citrus was telling me about his dream of starting an art guild for artists here in town. I believe he has already started gathering friends together for it. At the end of this month my friend, Alesha Martinez is going start running her contemporary craft gallery, "The Goods" right out of Citrus Salon. Currently she is gathering artists and work and we should be up and running by no later than Feb. 1.
ReplyDeleteI've been inspired from the GroundZero post you put up last week and I meant it when I said we should do it here. I have the energy for it. Art and Martinez are my two favorite things and I'd love to see them both grow. I think you, me, Lorena, Sally, Ed, Alesha, Roy, Hope, Chris and all the rest of the artists who love Martinez should all get together and brainstorm about what we can do to enhance the Downtown now. Maybe a fresh group would be more supported by the City Council and the citizens of Martinez.
A lot of people outside of the immediate Downtown don't know that there are people like us that want to grow this Downtown responsibly. They think redevelopment is the only chance we have to make any sort of difference here. Downtown deserves more then sitting in redevelopment purgatory.