Group backing arts in Spokane Valley

Spokane Valley. Home of safe neighborhoods, good schools and … a thriving arts community? Not quite.

Members of the Spokane Valley Arts Council want to change the city’s culture-deprived reputation. They want to see more public art displays, they hope to nab arts funding, and they plan to serve as a clearinghouse for Spokane Valley’s creative crowd.

“The Valley just has kind of grown without any art happening,” said artist Anne Sherrodd. “We would like to see more culture in the Valley.”

The council recently took a step toward its goals by installing a rotating exhibit of paintings at the Spokane County Library District’s Valley branch. Ann Koschalk’s depiction of an ancient Greek woman overlooks the library’s fiction section. A watercolor painting of an art studio by Sherrodd brightens a reading corner near the periodicals. And about 20 other pieces offer a new attraction for visitors.

”(Patrons) say ‘Whoa, look at that,’ ” said Valley branch manager Ellen Miller. “They go around and talk about each one.”

The library exhibit came about at a council meeting when Sherrodd mentioned that Spokane Valley lacked art spaces.

“I said, ‘Wait a minute!’ ” Miller said. ” ‘The wall space here is wide open.’ ”

The council is seeking other places to exhibit works ranging from traditional paintings to 3-D and performance art. It hopes to find a building in which it can hold an art show similar to Spokane’s Raw Spaces, an annual event in which an empty downtown building is converted into a gallery, said Dee Dee Loberg, who does marketing for the council.

For now, Spokane Valley’s exhibit spaces are limited to roughly one gallery and framing shop, some restaurants and a few doctors’ offices, Sherrodd said. The Spokane Valley Mall and local hotels sometimes display student art. Sherrodd knew of just one outdoor sculpture, which sits outside Blake Elementary School.

Loberg said that last year she tried to display in City Hall a painting done collaboratively by community members at Valleyfest. She said she wasn’t allowed to hang it on the wall because the city doesn’t own the building and didn’t want to be responsible for nail holes in the walls.

“This time we’d like to do a freestanding piece” to avoid hammering holes in the walls, Loberg said.

Loberg estimated that at least 1,000 artists live in Spokane Valley. Many of them display their work in Spokane and Coeur d’Alene because they don’t have hometown venues, she said.

“Artists don’t have boundaries,” Loberg said. “They go where the public is.”

Councilman Dick Denenny said that now that the city is up and running, it’s time to start considering characteristics, such as the arts, that give communities individuality.

“Now that the foundation is made, now we start looking at doing the things that make that house a real home,” he said.

Denenny said CenterPlace, a community center under construction at Mirabeau Point Park, will offer arts space. Mirabeau Meadows, a large field in that park, can host arts events now, and the Spokane Valley Heritage Center, a new museum being organized, will give the city another cultural connection, he said.

The arts council, formerly called the Arts and Culture Team, plans to house its operations in the Spokane Valley Chamber of Commerce’s new building, at 9507 E. Sprague Ave., by the end of this month. The council hopes to get its funding through private means and through an annual allocation in the city’s budget, Loberg said.

“Next year, we’re hoping to come before the city and ask them to give a contribution to the arts,” she said. “More importantly, we’ll ask them to identify us as the city’s arts organization.”

For more information on the arts council, contact Loberg at (509) 927-6873. self end