What Makes Rural Art Parks Successful? Recommendations for CED Art Lovers

Using the arts as a community economic development (CED) strategy usually brings to mind urban settings. Recent examples include Cary, NC’s shimmer field featured this past winter and magical stick sculptures opened this spring. But over two million people currently live in rural North Carolina. Are rural areas forgotten in efforts to use the power of art as a CED tool? Not at all. In fact, there are a plethora of successful rural art parks across the country leading the way. Simpson, Vollis, Recycled Metal Sculptures, Vollis Simpson Whirligig Park, Wilson, NC A year ago, this blog provided a series of three posts about an incredible public mural project in Kinston, NC. The first post focused on how the project got started, with information on the design, funding and selection process. The second focused on the artists’ role in the project. The third highlighted logistical and budget issues, and how the community was engaged even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. All featured valuable lessons learned. Rural art parks extend town-centered work into wide-open spaces, creating destinations. CED professionals looking at this development strategy need to know what the experienced ‘insiders’ consider keys to success. Officials at almost a dozen public art parks across the United States identified several success factors in interviews as part of a 2022 UNC MPA student study (links to all parks are found at the end of the blog). Each park’s official(s) mentioned a similar number of factors (6-9 factors per park), and all factors were relevant to the parks whether they were newly [...]