The World of Art Can Make a World of Difference: The Artists' Collective

"Hartford . . . would not be the same without the warmth of the instructors, the sound of tap shoes running down the hallway, Sheila's vocal class roaring from upstairs, the heartbeat of drums throughout the classrooms, and the instrumental music rising from the basement."
—Garland Davis Higgins, former student at the Artists' Collective

After taking classes at the Artists' Collective from 1978 to 1987, Garland Davis Higgins left the renowned Hartford, Connecticut after-school arts program to study broadcasting at Howard University in Washington, DC. Yet she returned to the small building on Clark Street in Hartford's North End to work as an apprentice and take dance classes during the summer months. Now a resident of Bloomfield, Connecticut, Higgins still takes dance classes to this day.

"They taught you to be proud and carry yourself like you love yourself," Higgins says. "If you respect yourself, other people will, too." Higgins believes the Artist's Collective helped her develop the poise and self-esteem that it takes to succeed in the professional world—a fact that encouraged her to send her two-year-old daughter for lessons today. "A lot of kids are afraid to talk aloud or dance in front of people when they come," she says, "but by the time they leave, they're different people."

Dollie McLean, actress and co-founder of the Artists' Collective, praises the program for bringing self-esteem and social responsibility to Hartford's youth. McLean and her husband Jackie, an internationally acclaimed alto saxophonist, started the Collective to give kids in Hartford an outlet to express themselves and encourage them to resist drugs, a plague that threatened the career of Jackie McLean as a young musician in New York during the 1950s.

Jackie McLean grew up in the Sugar Hill section of Harlem and watched performances by Duke Ellington, Nat King Cole, and a host of other jazz greats. He joined Miles Davis' band at the age of 18, which started him on his professional career. He was mentored by jazz greats Charlie Parker and Bud Powell. In 1968, the director of the Connecticut Commission on the Arts offered McLean the post of artist in residence in honor of his substantial career in music. For one day a week, he taught music at the University of Hartford while still living in New York. Several African American students came to see him play at a New York club and complained that they hadn't been exposed to enough art experience relating to their own culture. They asked McLean to consider taking a larger role in the program.

McLean agreed, and commuted between New York and the Hartt College of Music at University of Hartford between 1968 and 1970. During that time, he and wife Dollie began envisioning a cultural center which would create a place for Hartford kids, particularly in the North End area, which had a large African American, Caribbean, and Puerto Rican population, but no real arts community. In 1970, Jackie McLean joined the faculty at Hartt, where he later developed the African-American Music Department Jazz Degree program.

When the McLeans moved to Hartford, Dollie took the position of community liaison for Wadsworth Athenium, a prestigious Connecticut art museum. "The museum didn't own any art work by black or Puerto Rican artists," Dollie McLean says. She was charged with reaching out to the residents, who had become increasingly diverse. Like her husband, she had an active, community-oriented approach to her work and life. The Athenium and the Commission encouraged and supported the couple in their efforts to begin an arts center to help young people celebrate their culture and creativity.

Together with bassist Paul Brown, dancer Cheryl Smith, and visual artist Ionis Martin, the McLeans founded the Artists' Collective in 1970. "Being at the museum gave me a bit of leverage and opportunity to reach out," Dollie McLean says. After migrating through several make-shift sites, the Artists' Collective found a home on Clark street in a mid-19th century school made available by the city of Hartford in 1975. But it remains hardly the ideal spot: the rooms are too small for dancing safely and freely; the building lacks storage and performance space; and poor acoustics make music practice tough on the ears of students and teachers alike. Yet despite its cramped and outmoded space, the collective has managed to serve 600 to 800 students annually, enriching their lives with drama, dance, visual arts, and music.

The Collective offers workshops in the evenings, on weekends, and during the summer. Students pay by the class, just like at any multi disciplinary art school. But the free after-school program buses fourth to twelfth grade students from selected Hartford schools to the Collective for classes two days a week. Students receive instruction in dance, African percussion, vocal, instrumental music, and martial arts, as well as educational workshops in cultural heritage and history. The goal is to encourage academic achievement through participation in the arts, and encourage kids to stay in school. The program also emphasizes family involvement: Collective staff meet with parents on a regular basis to update them on kids' progress and inform them about opportunities to participate. Kids don't need to have experience or unusual talent to take part. They need only interest, commitment, and good attendance.

The Collective's Summer Youth Employment and Training Program prepares disadvantaged youth for employment in both arts-oriented and non-arts-oriented careers. In addition to the Collective's regular offerings, students participate in Life Skills Training, focusing on job readiness and career development. It's all part of a focus on growing into healthy adults. A production at summer's end includes a side-by-side performance by both professionals and youth.

Jackie McLean sees the Collective as an opportunity to help youth develop through the arts, and discourage them from getting involved in drugs. McLean struggled with addiction as a young man during the 1940s when drugs became abundant in Harlem and other black communities. McLean overcame his battle, and saw music fulfill his dreams by leading him to a better life. He envisioned a community center to help young people in Hartford appreciate African, West Indian, Latin-American art and cultural traditions.

The Artists' Collective also stresses the value of early learning. "We take tots for creative movement classes," Dollie McLean says, "where they learn up, down, right, left, turn around... When you see a young person come in not knowing her left from their right and then five or ten years later she's a gorgeous little dancer, I can't tell you what a wonderful feeling it is."

Newspapers including the Hartford Courant have extolled the Collective for enriching the lives of youth in the city. "We often get youngsters from troubled families, too shy to look a person in the eye, and next thing you know, they're up on stage performing," Dollie McLean says. And it goes beyond the individual kids: McLean talks about mothers who are accustomed to getting phone calls from principals and teachers telling them their kids are in trouble. "Then when the performance comes, they get to sit in the audience and watch the whole community applaud their child."

Over the years, artists such as Ray Charles, Dizzy Gillespie, Roberta Flack, B.B. King, and Wynton Marsalis have appeared at or performed for the Collective. Harvard University's Project Co-Arts selected the Collective as one of six exemplary community arts centers in the country. Coming Up Taller, a report by the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, featured the Collective as a noteworthy program providing children and youth with opportunities to succeed.

After years of thoughtful planning, McLean and her colleagues at the Artists' Collective have decided on a new facility that will better meet its needs and the needs of its students. It also helps that the projected spot in North Hartford is heavily-traveled and will give the program well-deserved visibility. The new building will have rehearsal space, a recording studio, administrative offices, and an exhibition hall. Bill Cosby agreed to be named as Chairman of the national capital campaign.

As Garland Davis Higgins knows, all the kids who attend the Artists' Collective don't end up as prima dancers—or even in the arts. But the good they bring to their students goes far beyond. "They're inspirational," Higgins says, "because they make you want to be great at everything you do." That goes for the arts, and for life.

The Artists' Collective
1200 Albany Ave
Hartford, CT 06112
860-527-3205
artistscollective.org/