Postcard Power! How An Art Museum Connected with Isolated Community Groups during Quarantine Using Postcards, Art Murals, and Community Partner Support
nat rosasco • October 28, 2020
Earlier this year as quarantine fell upon the US, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and its satellite contemporary art space, the Momentary, both located in Bentonville, Arkansas, wanted to determine how best to help their region’s vulnerable communities and bridge the inequity gap created by the effects of COVID-19.
After speaking with several community partners and assessing resources, we identified the need to foster connections with vulnerable, isolated groups, such as patients in hospitals and residents in senior care facilities.
The result was a Social Connecting Campaign, the components of which included a community-wide postcard campaign with art kits which delivered over 3,600 postcards with messages of hope, commissioned original artwork by nine local artists, and an art exhibition that traveled to 22 sites around Northwest Arkansas.
Postcards/Art Kits: The museum commissioned local artists to create original artworks for the postcards. Once designed, the museum invited the public to draw in and write messages of hope on the postcards. Once completed, the postcards were returned to Crystal Bridges, and the team included the personalized postcards in creativity kits that were distributed to patients and staff around the area in art kits.
Art Murals: The artists also created large-scale, colorful versions of their postcards which traveled to 9 hospitals and 13 senior citizen facilities around the Northwest Arkansas region for one-day displays at each location.
The campaign would not have been possible without the input and advocacy of community partners. Museums offer hope and inspiration especially in trying times, but without community partners, this impact will never extend beyond the physical boundaries of museum galleries.
Public Art for Racial education is an organization that believes that public art has an important role in racial justice awareness. They commission and engage artists to create public art in and for each of their communities. Through public art and accompanying public programs, PARJE believes we can better understand our true history, and it can help us to appreciate the rich diversity of our human family and challenge us to be engaged in contemporary racial justice issues.
Nicole M Brewer is a passionate advocate for anti-racist theatre. She has spent the last fourteen years refining and practicing an inclusive method of theatre training and practices which she calls Conscientious Theatre Training (CTT). She has authored four articles about the need for the theatre industry to shift from racist and oppressive models to anti-racist and anti-oppressive.
The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture is building a world where every cultural organizer feels connected to and recognizes their critical role in a vibrant movement for liberatory change. The Art & Well-Being: Toward A Culture of Health is a free guide for artists who place their gifts at the service of healing, working for both individual and collective well-being, recognizing social justice as the foundation of a culture of health.
La CASA (Center for Arts, Self-determination, and Activism) is a transformative $33 million initiative by Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción (IBA) in Boston's South End.This four-story facility will consolidate IBA's diverse programs—including affordable housing, education, financial empowerment, and arts—under one roof, enhancing access and community outreach.Supported by a $20 million New Markets Tax Credits allocation and $12 million in tax-exempt bond financing led by TD Bank, La CASA exemplifies a strategic partnership aimed at fostering socio-economic mobility.Upon its anticipated completion in 2026, La CASA is projected to serve over 2,500 individuals annually through resident services and youth development, with an additional 5,000 benefiting from its arts programming, reinforcing its role as a beacon for Latino culture and community empowerment in Boston.
The Welman Project aims to support educators by making the reuse of materials a resource for creativity in the classroom, and to increase arts participation in underserved groups. They serve educators, artists, makers, and families through three main programs: the Educator Resource Program, the Curiosity Shop, and their Creative Reuse Education Program. They are dedicated to using the arts as a space for healing and confronting social injustice.
Art Against Racism is a virtual arts exhibition which aims to lift up the tremendous array of creative works made in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. In doing so, project organizers hope that the exhibition will serve as an archive of the national artistic response to this historic moment.
