Chama Valley Arts

Cultivating creativity, learning, and community through arts and culture

At Chama Valley Arts, we cultivate creativity, learning, and community through arts and culture. We fill the gaps in our schools, collaborating with Chama and Dulce Schools to host their students at our arts center and working with other organizations to provide arts enrichment experiences in the schools. We offer youth and adult classes, camps at the arts center, and are opening a new pottery studio. In 2021, we inherited the Chama Valley Art Festival and Studio Tour, which is now in its 18th year. We host annual events such as the Youth Creator Showcase and the Winter Art Market.

One excellent example of how our community has come to be a part of all we do was when the volunteers who were supposed to help set up for the Entre Flamenco performance both got sick. Our director, Anita Massari, thought she would manage on her own. That day, two different neighbors checked in to see how they could help. Our community takes ownership of the arts center.

This summer, we offered stipends to middle schoolers to help out at summer camp and had some stellar young leaders show up. The Missoula Children’s Theatre (MCT) camp took place the week following the second Heart Strings camp. One student, Nicholas, decided to come to MCT after a great week taking care of the arts center and the younger campers. Nicholas played the part of the Giant in Jack and the Beanstalk. He had some big solos and backstage he guided his younger cohorts to make better decisions during the long rehearsals and two performances. These experiences will reverberate through his continued growth as he enters seventh grade and develops life-skills, which will be much needed in his transition into high school and beyond.

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The Santa Fe Community Foundation invited its nonprofit grantees to submit stories related to our July topic of Arts & Culture.