High Time to Accentuate Salem's Art Smarts

As Rome was not built in one day, nobody expects Salem's arts potential to blossom overnight. But this very day is the ideal time to begin to plant those seeds.

Painting by Dr. Sam Rouslin

(SALEM, Ore.) - Word has come down that the recent Salem Arts Fair held in Bush Park was a splendid success. Yes, it apparently drew many thousands of visitors and made some neat profits. But need we simply say "Hurrah" and rest on our laurels?

Any city worth its wait must necessarily nurture the arts. This is even more important for a state capitol that wants its public persona to extend beyond being an enclave for state government workers. I am peeved when picking up a local phonebook year after year -- and staring at the State Capitol at infinitum. Have we not far more to offer our citizens?

As the offspring of a commercial artist, I call for action. This is the blueprint we can implement:

1. Downtown Wall Murals: Let's mobilizing our young people to submit a peace mural design and see it come to fruition. Why Peace? That's essentially what Salem means. Kids need recognition, as well as an alternative to messy graffiti.

2. Bus Terminal Art: Both the Transit Mall and our Greyhound Terminal call out for photo exhibits. Can we round up some photographers to spotlight our points of interest? An array of outdoor public art from Eco Earth to the Beaver Family in Willston Park would be highly conducive.

3. Salem Puppet Theatre: Let's involve the young generation in puppetmaking and then performing under the auspices of the new Kroc Center. Proposed name: Marionettes of Marion. Costumery and scenery for these puppets represents an untapped art form.

4. OSH Art Therapy: As the new state-of-the-art OR State Hospital takes shape, let's make added room to use art therapy as an antidote to trauma and depression. If introducting non-threating creatures like fish or birds can serve as models for art, I shan't sound a peep.

5. Monthly Library Exhibits: As the adult sequel to show-and-tell, each month can present another theme for watercolors or pastels or acrylic paintings. Waiting for the annual State Fair is hardly adequate for a city teeming with so much latent talent. Better to brush up than brush off those skills!

Certainly the readers out there can come up with additional ideas, and fight for them to materialize. As Rome was not built in one day, nobody expects Salem's arts potential to blossom overnight. But this very day is the ideal time to begin to plant those seeds.

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Salem-News.com Community Writer Lee Coyne is the founder of Salem's Peace Mural Task Force and is both a writer-poet and amateur cartoonist. He loves to draw out human potential. Lee brings our readers stories from his combined career of journalism and gerontology, and explains that these paths shaped his values. This writer-therapist often views the world as the masks of comedy and tragedy placed upon the scales of justice. For him, optimism inevitably wins. "Lyrical Lee" has traveled to 30 nations aboard and was once a press intern at the UN. His first published article was in The NY Daily News in '59, dealing with the need for integrity in public office.

He also launched the nation's first tele-conference on health education for shut-ins, created the Eldermentors project in VA to pair retirees with immigrant students needing role models, and was the main catalyst behind CCTV's "Public Public" panel show here in Salem. Lee received his BA in International Relations and an MSW in community organization. He currently serves as a member of Salem's Library Advisory Board. To send Lee an email, please write to this address: To send Lee an email, please write to this address: notcoy@netzero.net