Mary Cole Mello
WATERBURY — On a warm July day, an ordinary classroom at Crossett Brook Middle School has been temporarily transformed into an art studio. Some students are putting the finishing touches on friendship bracelets, others are using spangles, wooden pieces, and beads to create collages.
One art student, Wyatt, points to a feather design he may give to his father who “likes colorful things.” Many have chosen to create an art project described by the teacher, a story bag. Given the amount of focused energy, the noise level is surprisingly low.
These six, seven, and eight year olds are attending a week-long summer art camp at Waterbury’s MakerSphere, the village’s art center.
The children’s teacher, Emily Danyew, is high energy herself and a firm believer in the importance of involving children in art.
“Taking a picture that’s in your mind and turning it into something you created … It’s powerful.” She also thinks about the need for creativity in the future. “Some of these children will have jobs that haven’t even been invented yet,” she said.
Exploring art is known to benefit a child’s growth. Among other things, it strengthens cognition, motor skills, visual learning, creativity, and language development.
Asking children to talk about their art is a natural way to build vocabulary. One young artist, Madeline, shows off her “story bag,” a cloth sack decorated with a picture of a castle. Her story is about the “fish family” characters she made out of wood, who live in the castle.
Another student, Josee, says she likes creating “chaotic” things. She displays a collage made with beads flowing across the paper.
Like Madeline, another art student, Maddie, created a story bag, but her characters represent her own family, including a cat who died, “But I’m pretending he’s alive again,” says Maddie.
But playing with art isn’t just for kids, and neither is MakerSphere.
If you ask Jan Gendreau, she’ll tell you she took a woodworking class, not to build things, but to fix what she has.
“I enjoyed the social aspect of the group,” Gendreau says, “We had a good time getting acquainted with some of the machines. … Stained glass, that’s my next challenge.”
Her friend, Renee Ross took the “Women and Power Tools” course. When she finished, she became a member of the woodshop. Members can access the shop up to three days a week to work on projects.
Since then, she says, “I have transformed a chair into a nightstand, built a small medicine cabinet from an old mirror, and created a custom tea bag storage box. … One of the most unexpected benefits has been the friendships I’ve developed with other members and the wonderful shop stewards. … The sense of community at MakerSphere is what truly makes this nonprofit organization so special.”
If you ask the founders about the history of MakerSphere, they’ll go back to one of Waterbury’s most turbulent times, the flood of 2011 when Tropical Storm Irene devastated the village. Residents were struggling to put their lives back when FEMA came to town and called a meeting.
MakerSphere co-founder Mame McKee remembers the meeting.
“We were focused on literal survival. We had kitchens to rebuild! (FEMA) asked us to stop for a moment and take a deep breath,” McKee said. “What would we do if politics didn’t matter, if dollars didn’t matter? They helped us to look a little higher.”
Then, the ideas emerged. Infrastructure needed to be rebuilt. The town center would have to be replaced. One group wanted a new library. Another wanted an art center. Some wanted mountain bike trails. The planners knew these goals also could lift the economy of the town.
It didn’t happen overnight, and it took money from grants and other sources along with hard work.
MK Monley, also a founder of MakerSphere, an art teacher, and the organizer of Waterbury’s Lantern Parade, became director of a project that would be named “ReBuild Waterbury.” The organization raised $1 million, then hired a case manager and a volunteer coordinator.
By 2016, the first phase of the mountain bike plan was completed.
Ultimately, residents chose to house both the new town center and the new library in one building. By 2017, adults and children were checking out books.
In 2019, the nonprofit MakerSphere opened. It began with a clay studio formerly operated by McKee. Adult classes now include clay, woodworking, stained glass, and a studio arts program. An after-school program run by the center has also been established.
This summer, many of the young art students along with several adults volunteered to create a mural at the intersection near the Waterbury Grange Hall, a tangible reminder of the ways in which art can be integrated into a community.
