Who We Are
The Jamestown Arts Center is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary facility created to benefit the community of Jamestown, RI, and beyond.
Mission
The Jamestown Arts Center engages, enriches and inspires through extraordinary arts and educational experiences.
Vision
The Jamestown Arts Center strives to be a leading arts and cultural hub where creativity, ideas, and innovation flourish.
Our Goal
We unite our community through the arts by providing a space for education, exhibition, rehearsal, performance, and art camps.
Who We Serve
Community is the fabric of our being. Collaboration and community ownership sustains us. Everyone is welcome to experience, create, and share extraordinary art.
Staff
Jon Baylor, Ceramics Studio Manager
Elizabeth Behan, Front Desk
Christine Cocca, Executive Director
Karen Conway, Exhibitions Director
Jeff Foye, Exhibitions Preparator
Melinda Katherine Frederick, Education Director
Kelly McDermott, Development Coordinator
Lucy Paiva, Development and Marketing Director
Charlie Tregenza, Marketing & Events Manager
Board of Directors
Didi Suydam, Chair
Jody Saarmaa, Vice Chair
Susan Hackman, Treasurer
Kate Barber, Secretary
Erica Connolly
Bob Dilworth
Diane Harrison
Courtney Hunter
Mary Hall Keen
Kara McKamey
Devi Ross
Marie Samuels
Our History
The JAC was conceived in 2007 by a group of Jamestowners passionate about the arts who collectively envisioned a dynamic arts center in the heart of town. This committed group became the organization’s founding board members and began working in earnest to make their vision a reality. In February of 2008, the JAC board launched a Capital Campaign to purchase and renovate a former 5,000 square foot boat repair shop into a beautiful arts center designed by Estes/Twombly Architects. The property was purchased on December 21, 2009, with contributions and support from many generous individuals and foundations and soon after opened its doors as a multi-disciplinary visual and performing arts space.
The JAC now hosts art exhibits, theatre and dance performances, film nights, events and concerts, and provides art and design educational programs for people of all ages. Programming partners include: Heifetz International Music Institute, FirstWorks, RISCA, FabNewport, 10 Thousand Small Businesses, RISD, Manhattan Short Film Festival, SENE Film Festival, Providence Art and Design Film Festival, Island Moving Company, The Jamestown Schools, Social Enterprise Greenhouse, The Brown/Trinity Rep M.F.A. in Acting & Directing Program and many individual artists and local organizations.
Since 2014, it's won 6 of Rhode Island Monthly's 'Best of Rhode Island' awards, including the Editor's Pick for Outdoor Art in 2021 and 2022. The Jamestown Arts Center has quickly become a leading arts and cultural hub, for Rhode Island and beyond, where creativity, ideas and innovation flourish.
Founding Board Members & Executive Director: Kate Petrie, President; Elizabeth Congdon, Vice President; Vivi Valentine, Vice President; Dianne Grippi, Vice President; Joce Donaghue, Secretary; Dori Hirsch, Treasurer; Anne Livingston, Treasurer; Abby Campbell-King; Lisa Utman Randall, Executive Director.
As one of our founders, Vivi Valentine so eloquently said, “The founders believed in the idea, mission and goal of the need for a ‘home for the arts’ in Jamestown. They put their personal lives aside, and worked tirelessly as a passionate, committed, collaborative group in order to achieve this goal. They used every resource at their disposal in order to make this happen. They used every skill they had and enlisted those outside the board for those they did not. This group of women became a community working toward one common goal and their original motto kept them going; We believe Art Transforms Lives.”