I I think I did yeah I think I was out doing some different things that day yeah so this is a meeting of the town of ammer public Earths commission and today is May 16th and I am not calling this meeting to order my name is Angela Mills I work for the town manager I'm just here to start the meeting and then I will turn it over to the wonderful chairs um and they can make sure that they have Quorum before they call the meeting to order I just will say as a point of order that this meeting will be uploaded to the town of ammer YouTube channel probably um in the next four or five days and um we're meeting remotely because of the wonderful Governor extending all of the great suspension of open meeting laws that is so helpful um before I go June 30th a couple of your members will be ending their terms on the commission and so at some point maybe during other items you could discuss whether or not they would like to be reappointed okay and that's my SPI for tonight would anyone like to be host okay thank you Angela sure I will make who is anyone sharing screens tonight who whom should I make the probably is yeah me okay I'll make you the host thanks Angela sure thing okay so again good evening everyone so it's um about 6 five 606 and um I just reset my clock to the wrong time I see okay but um so call to order um first uh first item would be to approve the um the minutes that I sent and these were from the April 3D meeting the meeting that we had on the 17th is the one where it didn't get recorded so uh I'm I'm going to go back and try to reconstruct that one from memory for us to review next time I took some notes if it's helpful this set of um minutes that I've sent you uh is from the thir so please take a moment to look through it see whether you spot anything that needs uh changing I read the minutes earlier I didn't see anything that needed changing me either I didn't see anything but I wasn't at the meeting so okay then um can I have a a motion to approve so moved and second thank you Mikey and quick show of hands for to pass the motion I okay I okay thank you thank you all very much I'll get those submitted to Angela for final posting um start with some updates on Electrify ammer um I need to get with Angela in the next few days about posting the call for artists I think we have resolved uh everything that we needed to do to get to uh this point where we can post that call um at the meeting on the 17th we did choose three electric uh traffic control boxes um one of these is in front of Big Y another is um um on Route 116 South of ammer college at was it called M Valley down there Robert and and then the third one is on Route 9ine east of ammer at the entrance to well Gate House Road entrance to Echo Hill Echo Hill area we uh also agreed that we would like to see we want to designate a theme which would be the the Youth of ammer I think youth we said we went back and forth on we had children first I think we decided on youth on youth youth of amorist celebrating youth celebrating amorist youth celebrating amorist youth thank you okay so those those are the fundamentals of the of the call and uh so the idea would be to give give people a uh a month or six weeks to formulate proposals and then give ourselves a month to select three and then get back in touch with the artists to let them know and um and then get on with the painting the actual painting of the boxes in September October most likely on the pattern that we've done before meanwhile I have a note in August to get back to uh Public Works to ask about the prep on the boxes that we need to that we need to to do and any last minute suggestions or requirements that they have uh just remind everyone that uh we did re review the selection of boxes with public works so we're not going to paint a box that they're about to tear down um or replace with a traffic circle we were warned off on at least one one of those so um so that's that's where we are on on Electrify ammer um I'm I'm going through this because I realized that not everybody was at the last meeting thank you okay um next up um update is on a percent for art and there's absolutely nothing haven't heard a word back from the town manager after the second memo that I sent you it was following the April 17th meeting where we filled out um profiles of seven people or positions to serve on the advisory committee for that and pass along two recommended names nominations uh for the committee also um reiterated some things from the first memo such as a m mural seemed to be U an obvious thing to us but also the possibility of some kind of 3D work that would either be inside the school or right in front of it perhaps um and did not go into a great deal of detail there I would think that um you know we didn't we wouldn't want to I think it's a sense of the commission that we didn't want to get too specific there and that other people needed to participate notably this advisory committee there um little side note here um Jim isn't able to be at the meeting here but for those of you who did did attend the last meeting we had this kind of Otherworldly experience where Jim and I had differing versions of the bylaw for the percent for art and he and I talked after the meeting and he sent me a copy of what he had and the one that he had was dated uh 2017 and uh had all the official trappings on it certifying that this was a you know a voted item and a true copy etc etc had the town seal on it and everything but it is different from the bylaw that appears on the town's website I did a little looking around and the first time the bylaw appeared on the website was in January of 2020 which was you know about three years after it appeared to have been passed and and everything and um so that that version that's there from in 2020 and repeated it each year with the update to the bylaws so that it's current in 2023 those have all been identical there's no change but here's what's interesting there is an important there are some important differences between the 2017 version and what has appeared publicly the main uh difference there well the first obvious easy difference was the original threshold was $100,000 it then got moved up to a million in what was published um I guess things cost more um inflation inflation but here's here's the here's the critical thing um under the 2017 version the money that uh was to come out of the project in question was to go into a kitty not the official term but was to go into a fund to be administered by um the public Arts commission and along with that there was not a not precise wording about what to do with the money it the the the the wording in 2017 says to Pro um you know provide uh for public art in in the town buildings and I guess the implication was well we're talking about the building who's paying for the project but it doesn't say that in the 2020 version it darn right does say that that it's limited to that building furthermore the money does not go does not go into a fund that APAC manages it's stays in the project budget and again another difference in 2017 any money left over after building that artwork remains in apac's budget and can be used for anything in the 2020 version 2020 and and since um any remaining money after the artwork is built produced created uh goes right back to the funding sources it does it does not carry over so basically uh the original uh percent for art is sort of the you know the ship coming in for APAC hey we're funded we've got stuff we can work with but but it got changed somehow so that now it's it's very strictly limited to the building in question and to the artwork in question and there's nothing nothing left after that so Tom wouldn't this be something that we could find in the minutes of town meeting or like I've been looking and cannot find it because that should be easily searchable right like by motions and votes because that would have to be voted on I would think that would have to be Council I'll have to go through I have to go through the all of the the the council minutes to see that but I is there easier way to do that is there a I I was gonna suggest might it be easier just to contact either or the town attorney they might be able to yeah I think that's have to do all this or or the people that used to be on APAC like I would contact Amy craw but we need we at the time we need official word yeah we Something official here okay um but and you know Jim told me that he was he was really surprised because he said he had enough involvement in Town Council and APAC through those years that he would have expected to have heard that this was happening anyhow so this is really not um 100% applicable to what we're working on now but I think it's very important piece of background and I for one I think I sense you agree with me that you all agree with me that we' really like to get to the bottom of this because uh I think has some pretty severe implications for understanding you know the town's commitment or not or lack of commitment to public art uh and to our commission and particular Robert did you have any other insights about that no uh other than I think trying to get uh information from the horse's mouth as it were you know either somebody fairly high up uh in town should know what what the actual mechanics of this are okay yeah I think I think that's right yeah I just wanted to say when I read the packet that was about the percent for art there's a sheet that lists the two August 26 2019 Town Council vote to establish the percent for bylaw ad hoc committee and it lists uh Kathy Shane uh councelor shriber councel Steinberg James Barnhill and William Kasin who was the chair of APAC three years ago you all have the same thing don't [Music] you yeah so and it says um and and a number of things after the list of people on the committee the focus of the percent for art bylaw at how committee shall be to update and revise the percent for art bylaw passed by town meeting in Spring 2017 okay so there that's that's some breadcrumbs for us to follow yeah and um it says specifically to the percent bylaw at high commit shall revise the previous bylaw to address concerns identified by the Massachusetts legislature clarify definitions respond to questions or concerns raised by Council committees and propose a revised version of the bylaw for consideration by the Community Resources committee and finance committee okay I think that I think you have that if you want I can scan it and send it to you I do recall seeing that now that you now that you bring it up yeah yeah so there's some stuff was going on but we are not uh told what it is you know we haven't been communicated and it goes on to talk about other deta real specific things that came up but you know it tells you that concerns were identified by the legislature but it doesn't tell you what the concerns are so I I mean it's not maybe it does give you some help yeah but not specific yeah that gives us I would think James would know something about it because he's pretty meticulous about keeping track of things okay just jotting some notes on that yeah I think speaking to the clerk of court would probably be a good idea find out what happened there MH I to see who that is who is the work office yeah they were supposed to file their report to the uh finance committee and the resources committee October 31st 2019 and to the Town Council by November 30th 2019 okay then that that would be that would be just a month or two before the bylaw was published in January of 2020 so they did complete their work yeah okay of course that also raises the question uh mostly moot now I suppose but uh was the percent should the percent for art have applied to the library project and to the uh North North Commons the um renovation which is just wrapping up [Music] now this is the the elementary school is the first time the the town is is activating the percent for art uh bylaw all right so the town clerk is Amber Martin is it Susan AET I'm sorry Susan AET and we can ask her um you know she can give us the public records we're looking for okay that is her job to the highest possible level of transparency Etc so okay right thank you thank you all this is very very helpful I want to find out what's going on there that's really confusing now they did leave in the wording of the bylaw there was no no change to the list of responsibilities which is which now reads rather strangely because it essentially has APAC you know deciding on dispersement of funds and essentially on project management but effectively that's been taken out of our hands and so that would may be a little bit um a little a little bit odd that you know some of the core items were changed but they never went through and followed followed through on all that so it's a little confusing as to what we're supposed to do other than give give some advice to the town manager okay all right right um last update that I have was that um about a week ago I had uh a our meeting with Liz Larson who is the interim director of the business improvement district and and uh let me look at the summary notes I made from that um she is working she has this one of her major projects the um the the restoration of the art walk the monthly evening when the art galleries are are open she's confident that that can happen starting in September she has an intern working this summer with the various businesses to uh to get that organized uh I told her that um that that APAC that the sense of APAC was we'd really like to see that happen and I told her that if she if she or her intern could use some extra extra help I'd be glad they could call on me for that um secondly um Liz saids she is trying to revive the ammer center Cultural District uh organization and that she would like uh APAC to be a member of that and I told her yes definitely we we would like to we would like to do that so I'll watch to see uh I I gathered from the conversation that she was thinking that was just weeks away from being reconvened I saw she sent some email to other um participants trying to trying to get that work organized bring that group back together uh at that stage uh just a heads up for for you all we would probably want to select somebody from the from this commission from the group here to uh to attend those meetings to represent APAC there um and lastly Liz said she is um about to start working on plans for the uh us um two 250th Celebration United States semi sentennial semi sentennial working on so we're working on that in Arlington right now because Arlington is working with you know conquered and everything so Terry had Terry had sprung that question on Paul bman yeah he was like what what like um we should probably do something like a yeah so um so I told her that um yes you know that's a great conversation to get started and that um we would be happy to sort of look at the public art aspect of that I think if we look back to the was it the 200th anniversary for town of ammer uh there were some there were some public art activities uh there and uh we can look back to those as sort of examples of you know it wasn't things that APAC funded one one of them for example was that illumination of one of the tobacco barns remember that photo it was documented by photographers so in not to get ahead of us but in my definition of things that's a public art thing um but we didn't have to you know we didn't we were just one of a number of friendly or cooperating co-sponsoring uh entities for that so oh I also suggested to Liz that she take a look at what uh they're doing over across the river in Florence haydenville and Williamsburg to commemorate the great flood of 1874 that's uh front page of the The Gazette I think today um and I find it interesting because they're they've got everything from um you know sort of Museum and archives materials and awareness and activities and excess to uh some actual Live Events so for one thing they're planning to ring church bells in series all the way down from where the dam was into Northampton and they're going to record that that that sequence there and there's going to be there'll be all kinds of you know live events for people to attend all everything you know from usual face painting and and stuff to uh um you know u p Public public talks and who knows what what else it's it's it's it's notably sort of multi multimodal in the things that they're looking at everything from you know a fresh public event to a serious look at um at dark at at archives and everything in between so I said well you know not not to do the same thing but you know let's look take a look and see there's some nice creativity on going on over there Dara the the tolling of the Bells timing is a quite a good thing that they spent time figuring out and I think if you heard it if you could hear it all live as it moves through the area it'd be pretty moving and oh yeah yeah and gra grave you know serious thing yeah I just I just love the I just love the the the freshness and creativity of a thought like that we when we look at historic events and such we it's we off we often make it too dry and uninvolving okay so those are the those are the updates and um are there before we get into the main agenda item here there any other uh questions or suggestions that people would like to make on just about anything okay I can tell you're all real real eager to move on into the definition of public art all right so this is the the the idea here is to take a take a fresh look at sort of the mission and policies Charter whatever you'd want to call it for the um public art commission and if we wanted to take a look at all right what what exists uh so far on this I'm going to try to share my okay is that showing public art Commission on on your screens not mine not yours sharing screen is always so tricky yeah I do it just infrequently enough to forget each time okay how about this trying to show the the web uh the web page yeah I see it now okay all right good I am not I will I will figure out why I'll figure it out you go go Ahad ahead please okay um so the paragraph here under the word Mission uh from from all the stuff I've looked through over you know the records in past years this this is actually pretty a pretty fair condensation of the various um purposes and responsibilities that have been listed so I think it is uh in addition to being current I think it is a good starting point for our discussion now I'll say first that nowhere in in this paragraph is public art defined and um I I think we'll see that that that in itself is something of an issue the the general charge up here to Foster Greater Community awareness of the interaction with public art I've got no idea what that means you know who interaction um you know what what's that getting at other than to uh promote or Foster awareness of public art itself maybe and through public art promote cultural diversity okay can understand that and an improved quality of life for ammer Citizens all right that sounds good but how would you assess whether you're actually doing it um you know not obvious then it second second part of this is a listing of so-called responsibilities and so to to list them it says developing guidelines for public art proposing to the town manager and Town Council an annual budget which we've not been doing seeking funding sources for public art um which we've not really been doing either uh encouraging the integration of art in public and private development well in public development all right we've got the percent for art um private development I'm not aware of anything we've done or even what that would consist of um interacting with all Town boards well I'm going to presume that that means with regard to public art so for example making sure that uh Public Works um gets in on the deliberations as appropriate such as for the traffic uh traffic boxes uh serving as a resource in educating developers officials and communities about possibilities for public art okay that's kind of an advocacy and well educational um charge uh and developing policies for public publicly owned Works in ammer Tom was this updated recently no I remember the first paragraph being there I'm not I'm not remembering the second paragraph being there well um this this is what's this well what's recently um this is this has not changed uh since you know in the last year um and the wording as I said before the wording does seem very consistent with um statements that have appeared in various other places such as in the bylaw on the percent for art now what this statement does not include is it doesn't say anything about the the town hall Art Gallery uh it doesn't mention anything about what relationship we have with uh the cultural Council so I think um I think there are things that it also leaves you know unaddressed so I've I've gone through this a number of times as you can tell from my sort of editorial comments uh on it um been a little bit perplexed um about trying to clean up hereit I wanted to mention that the first paragraph of this leaves a lot it's a lot of vague language which gives you lots of wiggle room um commission to commission to figure out what your missions and goals are I think I honestly kind of I like that approach because every commission is different and I don't like the idea of being told exactly what we should be doing that things should be evolving and changing as the commission changes but um as to the second part of that um that's pretty specific and I feel like we really haven't looked at that a whole lot so that's this is interesting to do that and if you look at if you look at other pages on the website there's like uh about the board on that page it just not not that one the next one uh on the public art commission page it has the commission overview which is just that first part the first sentence Foster a greater Community awareness with the interaction of public art through public art promote culture diversity and improve quality of life and that's the kind of one that I see more often don't really see this com this Mission very often so that's really interesting to me because it pretty specifically says what our charges um the first part is vague the second part is not I think it's probably I'm speculating but maybe the people who invented the mission language as you said left it vague so that it can be used in various ways and the second is saying and these are the things to be done in order for the mission to be accomplished right yeah I would like to focus more on those things because they are very concrete yeah well I think they're also by and large things we've never done as far as I can tell so I have tried to ask for a budget from our town manager and he told me that that's not really something that the art commission does that if we need money we um petition him directly as a individual I think he said um we don't go to the to the finance committee and ask for a budget which I found really interesting because that's what we do in Arlington I didn't know why there was a difference um but I I just assume that things are just different here we did change from a town meeting system to uh to this system we have now is it it has been relatively recent right 2018 I think was A Change Is that Mikey I think that's right yeah so we're still kind of new right yeah well the the commission has gotten funds from cultural Council grants yeah right but not from the town no I don't think that that would be considered the town at least in terms not really the mass culture council is from the state no I know where the money comes from okay but it's the money is is um used by the town and by choice of how the town chooses to use it that's not the mass cultural Council that's the other it's the um what's it called the one I'll remember hold on the mass cultural Council funds the local cultural councils all over the state right yeah but it's the local chapters of those councils that decide how the money's used yes so that would be considered the town because we're a commit of the Town they're a commit part of the town so they could count I'm just saying terms of language they could count it as that yeah there there were um public art projects in the past that were not that were funded by the town as opposed to um the the cultural Council so for example when the parking garage was built and the Poetry boxes were done I don't I don't believe that that was um ACCC funding but I've not been able to figure out whether that was just sort of a oneoff thing uh it doesn't appear to have followed any you know pre-existing guidelines for when and why and how you know public art gets funded so Thomas what are you suggesting that we do about the wording of that document you were sharing well um I my hunch was is to start is to go back and and take a look at what what definition we want or definitions we want to apply to public art and then try to follow some cases based on that now give you a a couple of examples I'm trying to um you know elucidate why why I think the definition is is the good place to start um okay we got our our old warhorse here the uh for want of a nail and ra the question how does how does something how does something yet to be designated and endorsed uh as public art so that starts as a private um you know a private Vision but how many of these how many other things in the history of public art in ammer you have done that and what might we want to do about building a pathway so that somebody who does have an idea doesn't have to wait for uh the public art commission to put out a call for artists but can float an idea and maybe eventually it does become public art and so what role how do how do we see what we do what how do we see our responsibilities um and our latitude of uh action and judgment uh in the light of of uh of a of a scenario I think that we would be advisory in that predicament if we had that scenario according to these serve as a resource wait wait wait where is is it um integration of art in public and private development encouraging so it wouldn't be that we fun it it would be maybe that we uh encourage Council advis that you know what I mean be a soliciting and that wouldn't be a project management but that would be more of a uh information sharing um sharing resources kind of thing maybe I'm not sure but yeah it's a really interesting case and it is it brings me right back to forant of a nail because that was a private project that we didn't have any Pathway to decide what to do with and so we were kind of mystifying and I'd like to not be in that predicament for the next one what's the status on that I miss that ultimate status what happened with it okay well we we wrote back to her to say that APAC was not endorsing her suggestion okay and you know she she wrote back U an email saying you know thank you for explaining etc etc but um I would like to know uh how' she put this she's essentially asking what is the pathway and I I wrote back and said hey we're working on that get back to you right yeah have y has everybody had a chance to look at that space yeah to look at what the space that she proposes to put that piece that she's had designed designed and head built yeah it's such a tiny space yeah and they just put they just put a tree in it yeah I don't think anybody has really studied the effect that the piece of art in that little space would have on traffic on all kind of things yeah here's this I think I I think what your I think your observations here point back to what Terry is saying and I think the advice would be hey somebody's got to talk to you know I forgotten now was it Planning Commission or uh public works for one or the design uh design thank you the design Bureau yep yeah to say you know to rather than us as amateurs shouldn't be the Arbiters in The Honorable sense of that word trying to become Arbiters of that and so I'm sorry go ahead y go ahead Mikey um also the historic commission would be good to have them talk to yeah yeah so circling back to Terry suggestion um one thing that's occurred to me and I think uh um I I certainly plan now to to pursue in some details would be to work backwards from the artists contract that the town issues when there's an authorized public work and you can make a checklist from it and that could be something we could use with a with somebody who's going to propose something to say you know have you have you looked at this the town will want to know uh these details going through the going through the checklist and then if it's you know we could maybe help them with some parts of it so for example if if it seems that uh Public Works needs to be consulted on that we can pick it up and sort of uh forward it to them and ask their ad ask their advice on it they were very very good very very good on the on the traffic boxes getting back within hours for everything that I asked and and more so I think if we were to say look here's somebody who's proposing to do this on this site and this is what we know so far what do you think questions you want to talk with them you you want you want to give us some questions to take back to them I think we can do that sort of thing so that we're providing um process but more importantly we're providing add some real assistance to both the artists and to the town to make this easier and uh so I think that's that that's a way that we can do this the second point and Terry what you s were saying points to this this is my second example and this has just come up um the I got an email from the director of the bangs Center and she's been talking with an art professor at ammer college who is going to be teaching a course in public art next fall and her plan is that her students will do a mural in the bangs Center and they have a whole interesting process they're starting to figure out where the students are going to interview um clients of the of of the bangs Center to just sort of learn what it is how it works what it feels like how people feel about it and that this will shape their conception of the artwork that they do and so the the the bang Center Director you know at least you know kudos to her she she thought to approach or somebody recommended that she approach the public art uh art commission I'll gather up and send to you the the the emails that have going back and forth she just uh just this afternoon out of the blue sent me an email saying did you see have you have you had a chance to look at the proposal well the proposal was just her quick outline a few weeks ago you know about roughly what they were thinking to do so I'm I'm now thinking through my response which is likely to be something to the effect um you know politely saying that's not a proposal for one thing say but but it sounds it sounds like a a project worth you know worth carrying forward and here's how I think we can help so you know there's this advice which we've been talking about here about what how can we how can we how can we set up a path so that the right kinds of thinking and consultation and back and forth and checking all happens uh at the formative stages and not as a veto at the end uh and it also occurs to me that and I I'll stop talking a second here but um there's maybe a pivotal moment in that project when the class the emmer college class decides what they're going to draw how what's the topic how big is it where is it going to be and that stage that feels to me like the time for an artist's contract with the town and that that's I think that's the good place to get all these things pinned down and and the artist contract includes addressing things like uh intellectual property ownership and the town graciously concedes that to the artists uh routinely in these contra TRS but it also wants to know about reproduction rights in other words can you use it in posters and and uh brochures and things so it's a whole train of things like that that that uh that the town has the town's legal department has has you know figured out to a fairly well and I think we can work backwards from that and help uh help uh you know help Things become public art and and without um you know without nasty surprises I think that's a good long-term project is to develop the actual policy you know in the pathway like you talked about I think that really nice really good Endeavor for the town but and if we don't do that it's not really being public art yeah and if you don't if you don't have policy that says this is where we put out calls for if you it anybody who's teaching a class can come up with a good project that can be made public in the course of their you know whatever syllabus they make up and whatever projects they make up but all the other people who could participate in something like that didn't even know there was a chance or opportunity yeah yeah and that's why you need to have the stuff figured out and in my experience I did not see that the commission for a long time had any kind of policy right right of almost any kind and you ask questions about how what worked this way or what worked that way it's always vague and so it makes it really hard to you know I'd like us all to be able to take a one- day seminar on public art by some real amazing person who could talk about about it you know it would clear up a lot of issues and help like make the playing field brand new because it needs to be it the commission needs to decide what it is and I I don't think that that's clear at really yeah you know I don't think just being an advisory committee is Gonna Get You much people are not gonna care about that that much right right that's kind of sad but I don't know but it would take a lot of work to make a real effort to give it a little bit of uh real not clout but actual presence yeah it's hard because there's a big difference between public art and private art and private meaning one individual person's vision of some piece of art that they want to make and what is the public vision of art that everybody in a community is seeing and is paid for and supported by the your tax money and your belief in your town yeah and we have to we have to make the tent big enough here in a way because we we have the you so if we take a public a definition of public art um how does that help us understand the town Gallery the art there is uh private creation yep um yet we we we address it under the public art tent here we have a place for it and that goes to a different aspect of I've seen of definition of of public versus private art private art is what you or I make or buy and hang on a wall at home and nobody gets to see it unless we invite them in so that's private we take um you take somebody's um 15 paintings and you put them up in town hall and you do not charge admission or or demand per have to ask permission to see them yep there so that's all good points yeah wonder I wonder if in the past the reason they did that was to raise money for the public Arts commission they used to be a fee yeah not a lot of money though I know but but it was artist right uh it wasn't who paid the fee the artist right so that seems to be undermining I know I I know but this is the information I got almost like renting it right Robert yeah so yeah that's an interesting yeah funding model on the backs of the people who trying to support I always thought the same yeah well um I think the you know when I when I when I look at the gallery there and look at the experience there and think in particular about uh our most recent artist uh so here you have um a a a woman who during Co gets this idea to pick up painting she'd always wanted to never had training etc etc um has some success her friends encourage her she finds her way to apply to display her paintings we accept uh at the uh artist reception she has about 30 friends show up they are wowed she sells a couple of The Works yep there you and those of us who saw her and were at the reception you just see her glowing this was a transformative that beautiful to see and she she wrote uh she wrote to Mikey and me uh just recently she said oh and by the way my parents came from out of town to see the exhibit you know and all right so we throw you know the the cherry on top of the Sunday here you know she planted this at the outset she said you know I'm a I'm I'm a Hispanic woman trying to find trying to find my way in art yep and we ended up giving her tremendous validation there so I think that contributed again it's it's this tricky Zone here because she's a private artist um but yet we you know we were um pulling the ores here for for diversity for a number of you know for just for the the also the promotion of this model of you know step forward and um you know be be recognized I I'll bet she never ever ever thought that she would go to a private Gallery with with a box full of paintings and saying hey would you like to show these all right so long winded at the end of our our hour here Robert yeah a quick comment so not in any way to undermine the value of The Gallery at Town Hall but you know the point you're making is also the the case that the people who attended that opening you said 30 of her friends I'm guessing most of the people who attended had some relationship to the artist you know I I think about you know public art and I'm I'm okay with a fairly vague definition of public art I think you know the the the more we try to have a very specific definition I I think we're going to lose the point you know um so but you know the the public piece of it I guess the problem I have with the town hall Gallery is that it doesn't feel very public in the sense of uh helping public art to create space in town in other words you know whether it's a sculpture in a certain spot or um you know some mural something that is part of uh you know helping to define a space I think helping or or exists so that anyone whether they know it's there or not can come upon it I mean if you you have to know that there's a gallery opening at the Town Hall Gallery you're not just going to casually pass by you know getting out of your car in a parking lot and walking to a restaurant in town you're not just going to pass by and and see that the way you would with uh a mural or a sculpture or rounding a corner and finding some unexpected piece of art you know which so I think you know I would love it if if there were funding of course because um someone would own the building presumably but um in an empty storefront you know that to me would be a great for the Amor public art commission Gallery because then you know you have Street access so that anyone walking by could look in and say oh you know there's a bunch of Art in there I wonder what that is and they would be likely if interested in art to stop in you know and and that would attract people other than those who already know there's a gallery opening going onere so and then just getting to the definition of public R2 you know I I just feel like we the commission needs to involve the public more I think the idea that you know five or six people who have volunteered for this commission to you know set the course for what public art should be in the town I I I don't again I feel like that's at odds with what I think most of us think about is public art you know so I think you know this professor at Hammer College I'm sure there are other professors at the other five colleges we have art teachers at the schools you know we have artists in the community we have people who just appreciate art you know it seems like there there's got to be a way to engage the public in helping to define or at least give opions on what what public art that's in town uh moves them what they feel engaged with what they don't feel engaged with I mean um you know as as lovely as the conversation is it it often feels like when public Arts mentioned in ammer it's followed immediately by you know Emily Dickinson and Robber Frost which it's great and we're obviously proud uh of that Association but there is a lot more and a lot more people of all sorts of cultural backgrounds um you know who are not necessarily represented by certainly great poets speak to people of all cultures you know I I just think there's there's a lot more that um a lot more engagement with the public that I think yeah I think Emily Dickinson's pretty well taken care of yeah I think good there Al you know now that we know the Taylor Swift is somehow related I think tayor Swift town for fun on the common I think might might work on that we should lean into that Association some really good conversations here guys thank you yeah any any final comments final in the sense as looking against the clock not uh uh not the topic here I would love to find some kind of an advisory Council kind of as Robert suggests and getting more um getting more input from the from yeah our constituents you know that is and I'm not really sure how to do that that's the that's the hard part you know if anyone can maybe we do little brainstorming and think of ways that we can engage the public in in helping us to um you know Define ourselves better and you know find what our purpose is I think as Robert was talking I think that would be really good work I I like um I think it was Dara suggested uh maybe if we could find a real um a really good person to speak to us about I think that would be worth looking to see looking around to see who are the leading lights um darl going back to your suggestion about finding um you know a brilliant speaker to uh to to help us out there may even be something out there on YouTube who knows Mike's got some good ideas for that too yeah for local people who are you know and I don't and I don't I agree with Robert's idea that it shouldn't be too specific because it has to be big enough to include all kinds of ways of meaning what you want to mean by public art I don't I don't mean that you're you're gonna have a rule book that ticks off a few things that calls it makes it what it want to call it it's not Art's not that easy to tame yeah right yeah no I I agree and you know uh I want to avoid painting myself as too much of a bureaucrat which of course was my career but um but where I'm interested in in the rules and the checklist and things comes to be like all right you want to put this sculpture up have you have you gotten permission from town C or has uh has somebody looked at this to make sure it's not going to become a danger to children you know that level of thing yeah oh yeah I and I think the the the Val the the The Virtue in the um breadth that we allow in the definition is that we don't want to get caught short because oh gee we never thought of that and we now we don't know what to do so you know my one of my favorite public art things and I I wish I could get to Italy to see this are those daytime fireworks I don't know if you've seen those it's like painting in the sky huh and it's a it's a combination of old uh old Italian yeah uh culture and pyate Technics and Chinese the latest uh the great practitioner of it um currently is is Chinese and it's gorgeous but it cost who knows hundreds of thousands of dollars so we're not going to do it and it last it last for 20 seconds so we have we have to answer to whether we thought that was a good use of public money yeah but if somebody came to us yeah if somebody came to us and wanted to do that I wouldn't want to be sitting there thinking uh oh we never thought of this well do the town do do a pretty big fireworks thing every year all the little towns around here do fireworks don't they yeah I think that's Chamber of Commerce funds that UMass yeah yeah so yeah okay any last um wisdom comments for the good of the order y okay well thank you everyone and um I'll make sure that this recording doesn't get lost um Angela mentioned the people that are up for um renewal yes yeah we need to talk about that that's that's darra and Robert yeah so um you want to be thinking about whether you would like to continue um from Angela's email to me uh it was you know could I find out whether you know you you guys would like to continue I think it implied that you could be fired but uh I think it's more more a question of but that would be that would be for for um neither of you what's that that would very I'm happy to stay on because okay I think there's a possibility that some big transitions will happen and it's nice to see that happening so I'm happy to stick around thank you Dara yeah thank you I'm glad to hear your your interest there because of the very nice contributions you've made all through okay all right we're gonna um I'm going to um break Robert's Rules and just declare that that we are let's make a motion I make a motion to uh end our okay I second okay and vote favor that wasn't so hard awesome thank you all so much good to see you okay take care bye everybody bye bye