Interview provided with support by Natalie Gerad, Karel Fellow with NLC’s Digital Engagement, Marketing & Communications Team
Arts and culture are fundamental to the vitality and well-being of our cities, towns and villages. The arts can inspire, heal and help our communities grow. NLC helps local leaders to leverage the power of the arts to improve the health, cohesion and resilience of their communities.
To showcase the amazing ways cities across America have used the arts as a tool for public health, NLC produced the Creative Cities video series. It profiles three communities: Loveland, CO; Providence, RI; and Tampa, FL.
In Providence (aptly known as the Creative Capital), art has become deeply ingrained in the city’s identity, so much so that the Providence Housing Authority embedded resident artists into their public housing communities. NLC sat down with Mayor Brett Smiley to discuss Providence’s connection to the arts and how creative expression unites communities.
National League of Cities: What do the arts mean to Providence?
Mayor Smiley: The arts are integral! They’re central to Providence. They’re central to our identity, and why people are proud to live here or visit here. We’re the Creative Capital, and we take that name very seriously. We support our working artists. We have a vibrant cultural landscape, including many performing arts institutions and an increasing array of public art options. And we are home to one of the finest arts institutions in the world, the Rhode Island School of Design. The arts impact nearly everything we do here in Providence, and that’s something that we’re both proud of, but also work hard to nurture and cultivate.
NLC: Can you speak a little bit about how the arts our connected to our health?
Mayor Smiley: The arts are a way for us to find shared connections, humanity and to create community. It’s also a way for people to express themselves, and in an era — particularly coming out of the pandemic — with social isolation and these echo chambers we’re forced into because of either digital tools or the news environment around us, it’s a way for us to realize that we are part of a larger community and to find those connections.
NLC: Why has the City of Providence continued to support the arts over the years?
Mayor Smiley: It’s wonderful that our support for the arts has spanned decades now, and I think that it’s part of the fabric of our community. That’s why many of us chose to live here. You know, we have these institutions that are now deeply ingrained into our community and have become a central argument in our economic vitality. It has become a major employer, and it’s what sets us apart.
NLC: Why is it so important for mayors, city council members and municipal leaders to prioritize the arts? What would you say to the city leaders who haven’t quite jumped on board yet?
Mayor Smiley: The arts are more than just something nice to look at or something to listen to. They’re major drivers of economic growth. They are also major employers here in Providence. They are contributors to community health and wellbeing, and they are at least a part of the solution to what ails us a society right now.
They’re how we’re going to find common ground experience, empathy, see the world from someone else’s points of view and come together as a more close-knit, tight community, which is certainly what I want for Providence and what I think all city leaders should want for their communities. This is how you bring your community together in a world in which we’re seeing protests regularly, and the highest levels of polarization and divisiveness in our society. The arts are the solution to that problem. And so, in addition to the real economic benefits, there’s community benefits as well.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Celebrate National Arts & Health Day
Join NLC in celebrating National Arts & Health Day on Saturday, July 26 by highlighting how the arts contribute to the wellbeing of your community. Proclaim the 26th as National Arts & Health Day in your city, town or village and then join the conversation on social media by showing off artwork from your hometown with the official National Arts & Health Day social frame. Download the proclamation template and social media graphics now and get ready to celebrate on July 26!
About the Author
Creative Cites: A Conversation with Tampa Mayor Jane Castor
- Georgia Gempler
Creativity and Collaboration for Healthier Cities
Arts & Health
How a Simple Board Game Changed a City Council for the Better
- Georgia Gempler
5 Ways Artists Can Help Local Government
- Georgia Gempler
How One Rural Town is Using Community Organizing for Fresh Food Access in Mississippi
- Georgia Gempler