Page 38 - BusinessWest August 8, 2022

The Art of Connection
ArtsHub of Western Mass Is Proving to Be a Needed Resource
By Joseph Bednar
“Like the steampunk aesthetic, Bruce Rosenbaum thrives on paradox.
His artwork is a blend of gilded era opulence, modern functionality, and futuris- tic aspiration,” author Daniel Hales recently wrote about the Palmer-based artist who specializes in creating steampunk-inspired objects. “Similarly, Bruce himself is simulta- neously an unapologetic dreamer — an artist building fanciful castles in the clouds out of very heavy materials — and also a very prag- matic and successful businessman.”
That article, one of many on the ArtsHub of Western Mass website (www.artshubwma.org), perfectly encapsulates the dual worlds of art and commerce that so many creatives must inhabit. They may create in isolation, but rely on connec- tion — of many different kinds — to bring their work into the light and make a living.
The ArtsHub, a free, centralized online portal that seeks to forge those connections, could be a game changer in that regard, said its found- ers, Dee Boyle-Clapp, director of the UMass Arts Extension Service, and Lisa Davol, Marketing manager for the Franklin County Chamber of Commerce.
Rosenbaum, Boyle-Clapp said, is “a person who’s an artist, but he’s always looking for other artists to hire because he needs people who have
specific skills based on whatever art project he’s currently working on. And he needed a place to find other artists. So the ArtsHub is a spot for him to quickly find people who are in the region he can reach out to and hire. That’s one of the roles
tance, funding, and collaborators. There’s such a huge arts economy in this area, but there’s a need for connection around that.”
The pair worked on creating an arts database in Franklin County, and similar efforts have been
LISA DAVOL
“We’ve all been trying find a way to get artists together because artists are kind of working in their own silos, and they really needed a place to gather to see who’s doing what and to find access to resources, technical assistance, funding, and collaborators.”
the ArtsHub is going to play.”
One of many, in fact.
“It’s a concept we’ve been talking about, and
that the arts community has been talking about, for years,” Davol said. “We’ve all been trying find a way to get artists together because artists are kind of working in their own silos, and they really needed a place to gather to see who’s doing what and to find access to resources, technical assis-
attempted in other areas of Western Mass. But the vision for ArtsHub, which caters to artists
— visual, performing, written-word, you name
it — across Hampden, Hampshire, Franklin, and Berkshire counties, started coalescing in ear- nest after the Western Massachusetts Economic Development Council convened a creative-econ- omy network.
“It was really the first time everyone in the
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