If you want to perform at AS220, you can.
AS220, a visual and performing arts venue in downtown Providence, is described by Umberto Crenca, its founder and artistic director, as "an un-juried and uncensored space."
"Our goal is to be as accommodating as possible to anyone who wants to perform or exhibit here," he said. "Though our primary responsibility is to people from the state of Rhode Island, we listen to and review every proposal that comes through our doors.
"Everyone's born creative and inquisitive and curious - everyone has a right to that. Everybody's voice and perception of this life is as valid as anybody else's."
Crenca founded AS220 in 1985, at a time when Providence was what he described as "a ghost town ... where everyone was trying to get on that train to Boston or New York." At the time, "even the artists were skeptical, because if anyone can perform or exhibit, there's no prestige. There's this set hierarchy about art ... but we don't want to support that attitude," Crenca said.
In addition to its galleries and performance space, which hosts from 10 to 12 live events each week, AS220 also maintains residential and work studios. Robin Amer '04, whose work focuses on radio documentary, has been living in one of AS220's 12 residential studios since January of her senior year.
"I feed off of being around other creative people. I find it really inspiring," she said. "If you're a college student who also considers yourself an artist, it can sometimes be hard to be in an environment where the focus of your life is academics and not making art."
The third-floor residency area is dormitory-style, with a common kitchen, living room and bathrooms. According to Amer, the ages of the current residents range from 19 to 53 years.
Once an artist has been granted a residential studio through an open application process, they are allowed to remain there indefinitely. "They don't want to increase artist instability. Once you're in, you're in," Amer said.
"The requirement is that you have a sensitivity to community living and that you have a passion for making stuff. Where you are in that process could be practically anywhere," Crenca said.
Because AS220 received funding for the specific purpose of creating low-income rental units, the rents paid by artists living in the residential studios is required to be no less than 20 percent of their gross income. In other words, residents cannot earn above a certain income.
"They're looking for people who will really benefit from this type of space," Amer said.
According to both Amer and Crenca, the biggest issue confronting the Providence arts community today is the problem of access to cheap space. "One of the things that was initially attractive about Providence was that there was a lot of open, affordable space and that's not the case anymore," said Crenca.
"What's going to happen to the next generation of innovators, visionaries and reactionaries?" he asked. "How are they going to blossom? Where's this going to happen?"
In an attempt to respond to this pressing problem by creating more affordable, safe living and work space, AS220 is in the process of expanding to include the Dreyfus Hotel on Washington Street, currently owned by Johnson and Wales University. "They're selling it to us at a very reasonable price. This project would never happen if it were privately owned," Crenca said.
The new space will create about 19 new residential studios - small, efficient, loft apartments - and seven work studios.
Crenca said he was shocked by the positive response the expansion project has received. He said in the past he had to fight to get support and funding for AS220's work. "Now we walk into the bank and they're telling us why they want to do the project. We're not used to that," he said.
The students of American Civilization Senior Lecturer Paul Buhle's oral history class have supported AS220 and the legacy of the entire Providence art community in another way. Crenca was one of the many artists interviewed by the students as part of "Underground Rhode Island," a project exploring the alternative cultures and arts of Rhode Island since the 1950s.
"The goal has been to get a grasp on the scene ... to understand what has happened and what is happening now, how the people that have been a part of it understand it, to understand what's the connection between art and life," Buhle said.
This past summer, four of Buhle's students - Megan Hall '04.5, Krista Ingebretson '06, former post- Executive Editor Micah Salkind '06 and Julia Wolfson '06 - compiled the collected interviews into an exhibit at the Newport Art Museum and Art Association.
"Often oral histories are transcribed and then shoved in a library somewhere. I wanted to present oral histories in their spoken form and encourage people to interact with them," said Hall, who said she tried to make audio the main attraction of the exhibit, which included listening stations connected to the visual presentations.
Buhle said AS220 is important in the greater history of the Rhode Island art. "Inevitably, AS220 is one of those anchor institutions where a large number of underground Rhode Island-types interact. Bert played such a key role in making things happen," he said.
The past 20 years have certainly changed the public perception of AS220. Originally regarded as "a bunch of weirdos," according to Crenca, "the acceptance has grown to the point where sometimes we're reacted to by the younger artists as an institution. It fluctuates - sometimes we're still groovy and cutting edge, sometimes we're viewed as being ... not radical enough.
"But that's what happens when you become sort of institutionalized - you become a reference that people can either play off of or play with."
