65B - ARTS AND CULTURE MASTER PLAN

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Santa Ana Arts Future Community Arts and Cultural Master Plan In the 1980s, residents began to see the economic value of creating a strong arts and culture infrastructure. The foundation for the current art scene was laid in place with the gradual creation of the Grand Central Art Center, Orange County Center for Contemporary Arts, Orange County High School of the Arts, The Wooden Floor, and Orange County Therapeutic Art Center. Independent gallery spaces began to emerge and artists used other vacant spaces to produce their art and market themselves across the street from the Bowers. Many changes throughout the years have created challenges and opportunities for artists and creatives in this historically rich arts city. As of 2016, more artists, public art, and creative entrepreneurs are actively contributing to Santa Ana's arts and culture scene than ever before. As stewards of this legacy, the City and the community as a whole should preserve, promote, and value the work of previous generations and the long tradition of creativity in the Golden City. Santa Ana: Arts Today Santa Ana is a rich and growing arts and creative community. The arts, cultural, and creative ecosystems present an opportunity for Santa Ana to be a thriving city that honors and preserves heritage while building on new creative energy. The Santa Ana Community Arts and Cultural Plan is a roadmap for success, building on the shared vision that emerged throughout an extensive community engagement process. The idea of developing an arts and culture master plan has seeds in the City's five-year strategic planning effort. A review of the community input for that plan indicates a high level of interest in developing the community's access to arts and cultural activities and the desire for the City to take an active role in that endeavor. Understanding the context for cultural planning in any city is critical for ensuring that the plan addresses that community's needs in ways that are grounded in authenticity. In Santa Ana this contextual exploration helped the planners understand the demographic, economic, and cultural factors that impact Santa Ana residents' hopes, aspirations, and challenges. Santa Ana is unlike any other city in the Orange County region. While many of the neighboring cities flow seamlessly and homogeneously from one to the other, one driving through Santa Ana from a bordering town will immediately feel that they have entered a unique place; one described as having "a distinct charm and a heart." Murals freely distributed on walls throughout the city tell stories of locally historic and heroic people, events, and places. Each of the 64 neighborhoods create a patchwork quilt of communities within the city at large, each distinctive for its geographic location and the people who live there. In Santa Ana historic homes coexist alongside modern condominiums; up and coming bakeries and hip new restaurants are side by side with iconic fruterias and taco shops; and botanicas and quinceanera shops sit next to trendy streetwear stores. Creative agencies, art galleries, studios, artists, and popular gathering places inhabit lofts and offices in the Santa Ana Artists Village downtown. Santa Ana has an extraordinarily strong community of individual artists, particularly visual artists, who want to work in Santa Ana into the future. Cultural institutions such as the Bowers Museum and The Wooden Floor help form a fuller complement of offerings that together create the city's rich cultural life. 12 65B-16