As a relative newcomer to the Berkshires (seven and a half years now…) I wasn’t here twenty years ago, but I strongly believe that we are in the position to make a ‘great leap forward’ which I believe has happened over the past twenty years, as the culturals have grown, expanded, matured, professionalized, and of course a number of great new ones have come along, like Barrington Stage, IS183, Mass MoCA, the Colonial, the Mahaiwe, etc. What I am seeing is that there are cultural organizations out there that are interested in relocating and coming HERE, which is a great vote of confidence and interest and adds to our critical mass.

My favorite quote out of the creative economy initiative comes from you: We want people to associate creativity with the Berkshires the way they associate wine with Napa Valley.

To your second point, I also agree. But it remains part of the economic landscape. Too often the arts are presented as a kind of luxury item, when, to your point, it is a crucial part of the social fabric. We create ways to propagate the telling of stories, the viewing of self-expression, and the hearing of voices because we need to have these things.

To my mind, the most important role of the arts in our region is social–it makes us a society. The economic aspect is essnetial and so is the aesthetic but it is the fact that the arts bring us together and make living in our region special that cannot be forgotten.