The Goal
We need to develop a far better image of our community than a beach town where the irresponsible can go to get drunk and go wild. We need to create a direction that we can all truly be proud of. We need to encourage a far more acceptable image year- round and promote it with events that reflect this new direction.
The Idea
Pacific Beach is a community that has begun to express itself creatively with such artistic endeavors as colorful and interesting murals, sculpture and similar activities. We can move forward with these efforts leading the way. We already have a good start. We have a beginning.
Now is the time for us to consider an even larger creative theme. We’re talking about the encouragement and assistance for the development of great, new murals and related activities. We’re talking about making Pacific Beach a great tourist destination because we are becoming a genuine visual delight, not just for our beautiful beaches and certainly not for our booze.
To do this intelligently, it will require the formation of a broad based "Pacific Beach Creative Arts Committee" that can lead the way in helping to accelerate mural creations and similar activities. This means working on ways and means for supplying paint and scaffolding for willing artists who can produce quality work. This means talking such artists into doing the actual labor at no cost (or low cost), with the incentive that they may sell prints of their murals in stores and booths in our beach community.
This idea also includes the creation of a once-a-year "Pacific Beach Creative Arts Fair," possibly utilizing the layout footprint of the "Beach Fest" event. It can be an exceptional activity with a great amount of applied imagination that can delight all who attend such a function.
Some Of The Details
The Creative Arts Fair can be different from the many other art fairs in our city, in that it can have the murals (that are to be encouraged) as the central theme. That can make this fair unique and original if efforts have been successful in creating more interesting murals throughout the rest of the year.
The public elements of the fair can include many outstanding possibilities. Among them:
A mural and/or a sculpture that is created by the artist during the event.
Quality, live acoustical jazz musical performances (not raucous but inviting).
A good number of interesting arts and crafts booths. (Good money maker.)
Special food booths from local, beach area restaurants.
Sidewalk mimes and other interesting street performers.
Quality fine art originals and prints with well known artists in attendance.
Promotional booths for Pacific Beach and neighborhood organizations.
Resources
The Committee must be our doing. It must come from within our own community. We must have enough people with imagination and interest and the willingness to roll up one’s sleeves and get seriously involved. Appropriate media attention to the effort should bring in a reasonable response. (I believe many of the local TV channels can be considered responsive to the idea in a positive way.)
The Arts Fair is another matter. Thank goodness there are professional groups out there who know how to put something like this together. The writer of this report has contacts with professional groups that bring in arts and crafts vendors and booths for local events. He also has contact with the group that organizes the sidewalk painting events in Little Italy. There are also contacts with local and regional artists and possibly even nationally known artists that can be applied to the mix. There are no end of possibilities here.
The Need For Personal Resolve
This is, of course, not something that must be done. We don’t have to do anything. But it might be wise of us to consider doing something. And with that in mind, it might be reasonable to consider this idea as possibility worthy of serious consideration.
If there should end up being enough interest generated to actually move forward on this, please realize that this writer will help in every way possible. I won’t leave you in the lurch. But please do remember, even though I am advancing this detailed concept, it is not my personal property. If you and others want to carry it forward, it will also be your project, a project I will be proud to assist in every way that I can. It will belong to all of us in this little beach community and it will be our cooperative responsibility to work well together and make it happen.
It is my sincere hope that we will have the personal resolve to bring this about — to create a wonderful visual experience and a great new direction for Pacific Beach. Always remember, this is our community and we are responsible for making it whatever it will be. Let us help it to become a place we can once again be very proud of.
—
