BECKLEY, WV (WOAY) – New developments are underway at the Beckley Art Center that will go toward further improving art education in the community.
Since the onset of their now 3-year-old music program, the art center is expanding the program by adding music rooms to their Art Lab in the Dan and Cynthia Bickey Art Center.
“Our big goal at the Beckley Art Center is arts, community, and education, so it’s really good for the community to be able to come have a space that they can just practice music in,” says Seth Hughes, the performing arts director at BAC.
Since 2019, BAC has been working with the Academy of Creative Arts to bring music workshops and private lessons to their students.
The art center also had established a youth theater program they were forced to cut during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
After having to move from their studio space in downtown Beckley in 2021, the art center’s new mission is to rebuild the music and theater programs at their current location on Johnstown Road.
“I’m really excited to finally get our music program moved into our building and I feel like it’s really going to round out the things that we can offer to the community,” Saja Monteague says, the visual arts director at BAC.
“So, not only can we offer visual arts, and dark room, and stuff like that, now we can offer music lessons, and potentially, once we get there, we can build back up our youth theater program. We will have a really nice space completed to do that,” she adds.
In addition to re-building them, the goal for the art center is to bring in more students and teachers to the programs, along with holding seasonal recitals and performances for the community.
The completion of the space will provide the art center with more opportunities to expand their performing arts programming.
