SPECTRUM: Painting a familiar picture

By NEALE GULLEY
Contributing Writer

March 02, 2008 07:48 am

— Two years ago, as an undergraduate student in western New York, Lizabeth Allen decided something felt wrong.
"We didn't completely agree with the conservative Christian society we were studying in," the local painter said.
The plan was to drop out of Houghton College, attend nearby Monroe Community College and open a kind of studio. After all, she and her friends had been spending most of their time off campus, hanging around the art galleries and cafes in nearby Rochester.
"All of us had so many different kinds of gifts, I guess you could say. I was really into art. My friend Dan Bish, he was really into karate. And he wanted to have a karate studio. So it was going to be a kind of art gallery/karate studio," she said.
ECLECTIC ASSOCIATION
She never did open the place, but the idea grew into an ardent vision for Allen, one she kept with her when she moved to Plattsburgh in 2006.
It's a new twist on an old idea: to open an all-ages hangout in the City of Plattsburgh.
Of course, Allen knows one person's idea of art is not necessarily the same for another, especially insofar as the law is concerned. She and a friend got 100 hours community service apiece for spray-painting graffiti underneath the Smith Weed Bridge last year.
But she estimates she has since spent considerably more time in pursuit of a different kind of community service. She is trying, through word of mouth, contacts with underground booking agents and an eclectic association of enthusiastic local artists, to ferment a community arts infrastructure already known to many as Koinonia.
The last, closest thing to satisfying the perennial desire for a downtown youth center lapsed in 1999, when Something Cool went cold. An erstwhile ice cream and soda-pop shop, Something Cool occupied the space at 22 Brinkerhoff St., now home to Taco Loco, from 1997 to '99 and became popular with teens and adults.
Before that, hubs such as the White House on Oak Street had tried and failed.
Allen, 21, thinks it's time the pendulum started swinging back toward the all-ages crowd.
"All we have are bars and a ton of cops," she said. "It's kind of intimidating for high-school kids; they just automatically feel like a bunch of hoodlums."
BROAD-STROKE MESSAGE
Allen hopes to someday obtain property in the city -- somewhere to attract and display hip and edgy artwork and musical talent -- but in the meantime, the goal is to organize the publicity already surrounding concerts held in the basement of Trinity Church and perhaps form a working relationship with North Country Cultural Center for the Arts. The nearly revitalized Strand Theatre is a serious temptation to some in the music community who are interested in attracting notable bands.
For now, she maintains a Facebook account, and another on the popular social networking Web site myspace.com. Together (not barring repeat customers) they have 348 members -- individuals who voluntarily link their user profiles to hers out of an interest in the broad-stroke message Koinonia seems to offer. To wit: association, fellowship, intimacy, a share in a joint venture.
THE BALL STOPS ROLLING
The sentiment is nothing new.
Efforts by Ward 5 City Councilor Amy Valentine and the late Mike Mannix in forming the Youth Center in 2004 produced blueprints for a proposed renovation of the former Plattsburgh Air Force Base bowling alley into a multifunctional youth facility.
They got as far as developing a self-sustaining business model reliant on, among other things, private sponsorship. But in May 2006 the group met for the last time, forced to postpone its work indefinitely while Mannix underwent treatment for cancer.
According to Valentine, the city had for a number of years received requests from both kids and adults in the community who wanted a place to call their own.
"It was kind of interesting, simultaneously both OneWorkForce and United Way understood that there was a need for a youth center for our county's youth," Valentine said. "We decided to move this venture together, these three different entities, and we established the Youth Center commission. We had student representation from every school in the county."
The commission had begun asbestos removal at the site when illness forced Mannix to bow out. Ultimately, the committee was dissolved.
Despite his battle against cancer, Mannix, who died in December 2007, never lost passion for the project.
"When I last saw him, before he was re-diagnosed, he said to me, Don't worry, even after I retire, I'm still going to head up this committee.'
"And then it just didn't happen," Valentine said.
"You have to understand that we had been making great headway. The kids, you know, they wanted tutoring at the center; music; they wanted a room where bands could practice, a computer room. They were thinking of having their own radio station -- there were some really sophisticated ideas."
Although optimistic that things will pick up where they left off, Valentine said the passage of time and changes in city leadership could present challenges to getting the ball rolling again.
OPEN-AIR ARTWORK
So what are kids doing in the meantime?
One issue surrounding youth art culture and Allen's own experience in seeking an outlet centers on vandalism by frustrated young people with a desire to express themselves at all costs. Those who deal with the fallout of such frustration, such as Plattsburgh City Police Detective John Barry, who handled Allen's case, acknowledge that the subject is murky at best.
"We don't have the problems that big cities have," he said. "But it is a problem as far as individuals spray-painting private property."
Not that Barry has any problem with artistic expression, as long as it's legal. He has looked into the idea of a "free wall," where open-air artwork could be permitted, but after some research, thinks the programs have failed in many of the communities in which they have been tried. One reason is that the concept of graffiti as being illegal appears part of its overall attraction.
"They found that when they used these walls, individuals would tend to put up their graffiti on that wall, and then go elsewhere, to a non-regulated area, and that vandalism has increased in the general area off the free wall," he said.
In fact, many communities have gone the other way, turning to graffiti eradication and abatement programs, calling on local public works to remove graffiti within 24 to 48 hours of its discovery.
But some of the cases he has seen don't seem to fit the mold of the typical vandal, appearing instead to be the work of rather more art-minded "vandals."
"There's some graffiti where you can see the individual has a lot of artistic ability and the outlet is not there for them, whether that's some type of community program or not."
But it still damages someone else's property.
On the other hand, Barry cited the mural on the broad side of what used to be club Ground Zero on Durkee Street.
"A lot of people look at that and say, well if private people can do that, why can't I, and that's one of the arguments," he said.
SEEKING THE POSITIVE
In the absence of a defined space, kids will be kids -- young adults will be young adults -- but the bored and malcontented are not likely to sit quietly.
Catie Wurster, 21, of Plattsburgh, said some individuals have been hosting shows in the basement of a nearby residence. But the threat of a city noise ordinance and the desire not to offend neighbors means the arrangement is limited.
"There has to be something," she said. "I remember when I was a kid, if I didn't go to shows "¦ That's a way to get out your energy, your anger."
Something Cool owners Evan Lavine and Holly Patrick closed their shop amid much positive feedback regarding the role the business played in the lives of young people.
By hosting "alternative" music performances and allowing the store to effectively double as a hangout for local youth, the pair earned a reputation for catering to the needs of an often-overlooked subculture and establishing a vibrant, receptive outlet for kids, devoid of alcohol and drugs.
"The youth of Plattsburgh, the 20-somethings, even the guys in their 30s, 40s and 50s who all have this drive to do something like this "¦ It can be done, and if it is done it would be something amazing and beautiful for the city," Allen said. "It wouldn't be some crazy rebellion. The crazy rebellion now is all the negative attitude that people have about Plattsburgh, you know.
"The reason why people feel so negative about it is because they aren't able to not necessarily do whatever the hell they want, but do something that they feel passionate about.
"It would do something extremely positive for this town. It would be nothing but positive.
"The negative is already here."

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