Washington Avenue Art Crawl (WAAC)

Project Location:

Edison Neighborhood, Kalamazoo.

Briefly Describe Your Project Idea:

Washington Avenue Art Crawl is a new quarterly event. Several Edison Neighborhood Businesses, and Kalamazoo-based nonprofits, are working with the Edison Neighborhood Association to curate local art throughout the Edison Neighborhood. We are partnering with Arts Council of Greater Kalamazoo, Jericho (a studio complex in Edison) Ty’s Joint, The Wax Factory, The Dormouse Theatre, Mint Cannabis, Fire, Black Wall Street, El Concilio and a large group of local artists to make WAAC happen.

Why does your community need this project?

The Edison Neighborhood is home to nearly 10,000 people, and we don’t have many neighborhood-wide community events taking place here. We need this project to connect people who live in the neighborhood and strengthen the social fabric of our community, and bring more art into the neighborhood.

What do you hope to achieve through this project?

We hope to create stronger connections between neighbors in Edison, and to connect Edison to the Kalamazoo Community as a whole. Our Neighborhood has been a HUD low-income are for 30 years. We are working to get residents involved in projects that improve quality of life, and we think that a collective art event is a great place to start.