Painting a vibrant community: New Art Center offers opportunities for expression
New Art Center is a community art center located in Newtonville, MA. Below, the team shares some details on their business and the importance of supporting local.
Describe your business:
We are a nonprofit community art education space that offers everyone, at all levels of ability, exceptional opportunities to make, exhibit, view, think about, and talk about art.
What makes your business unique?
We are a community-driven art center. People come back because they love the teachers, their classmates, and our staff. It is a very personal experience to create art, and our environment makes it comfortable for artists of all ages to experiment and get creative.
What does your business look like?
The New Art Center has two locations: 61 Washington Park, and the second a gallery space at 245 Walnut Street. We also offer online and hybrid classes and talks so learners can join from home or wherever they find themselves.
Why is it important to support businesses like yours?
With so much happening in the world, people are turning to art to express themselves, share their thoughts and feelings, and learn a new skill. We are proud of the scope and reach of our programs. Annually, we offer 450+ classes for adults, teens, and children and enroll more than 2,500 students from more than 56 different municipalities. Our school vacation and summer programs provide parents and caregivers a safe and engaging space to send their children. We are the only nonprofit, educational venue in Newton solely dedicated to the visual arts.
Do you want to say anything to your customers?
We are so thankful to our longtime community members and are excited to welcome our new friends to our space.
How has your business changed or adapted during the COVID-19 pandemic?
We completed some important and exciting capital improvements to our main building while closed due to COVID-19 to ensure the safety of our students, faculty, and staff, including:
– Improving the air quality throughout the building by adding air exchange units to bring in fresh air all year round
– Adding HVAC with ultraviolet filters on the first and second floors. These systems will be equipped with fans to run the ultraviolet filters all year round and will make the building significantly more comfortable in warmer months
– Adding stand-alone ultraviolet units in the basement
– Adding touchless sinks and toilets in the bathrooms
– Adding a new, ADA-compliant bathroom in ELVAS, our Extra-Large Visual Arts Studio
– Enlarging the lower-level classrooms by removing partition walls
We have also introduced online, pre-recorded, and hybrid classes. All our galleries are now in-person and virtual using a program called ArtSteps.