NOTE: Until we have a fund set up to receive donations in support of the retreat center, we welcome tax-deductible donations to Carpe Diem Arts to advance our work bringing artists and programs into schools and communities on both sides of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge.
Scenes from our Shore programs
Our “Dream Big” video features scenes from our Shore programs. The soundtrack is an original song written last summer by a group of 10-13 year old girls, with award-winning author of young adult fiction, Mary Amato.
Photos from Shore Retreats stays
The Vision for Retreats on Broad Creek
The Broad Creek Retreat for Artists and Non-Profits will:
1) Provide artists with the opportunity to create new work in a place of natural beauty and quiet on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Visual artists, writers, composers, and performing artists will be welcome for a period of days or weeks to concentrate on their work, in an environment free from the demands and distractions of their normal daily lives. Included in the vision are cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary projects, bringing together artists from diverse backgrounds and traditions.
“Artist communities are not about retreat; they are about advancement. Advancing creativity. Advancing human progress. Advancing the way we examine the world. Artist communities are research and development labs for the arts, providing artists of all disciplines with time, space, and support for the creation of new art and ideas.” ~ Alliance for Artist Communities
2) Offer frequent classes, workshops, and residencies in the visual, literary and performing arts to the local Shore community and to other visitors and groups, by way of extending the benefit of exposure to great art and great artists, and to a broad range of cultures and traditions.
3) Provide non-profit organizations with affordable access to a retreat center for leadership training, strategic planning, organization development, and refueling – with priority given to organizations promoting and supporting the arts and humanities, civil rights, democracy, education, the environment, juvenile justice and prison reform, health and wellness.
4) Continue offering accommodations to artists engaged in residencies, workshops and performances in schools, special needs facilities, senior centers, and other community settings, as well as concert venues and festivals on the Eastern Shore.
More than 150 visual, literary and performing artists have reaped the benefit of spending time at Shore Retreats on Broad Creek. Included are Lawrie Bloom, co-artistic director of the Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival and clarinetist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Jillian and David Minton of Lumina Studio Theatre, Malcolm Dalglish, Dervish from Ireland, Smithsonian Discovery Theater, Mark Jaster, Phil Wiggins, Andrea Hoag, Dar Williams, Willy Porter, Natalia and Arianna Zukerman, Lea Morris, Mary Amato, the 10-member Friends of Sironka Maasai Troupe from Kenya, Gerdan of Ukraine, Christylez Bacon, Gerdan of Ukraine, Karim Nagi, Andrea Hoag, Antonio Rocha, Adventure Theatre, Diane Macklin, Maureen Andary, Diana Sáez, Michael Bobbitt, José Dominguez, City at Peace, Shizumi Manale, Sandy Tolan, Diane Macklin, Robert Kikuchi-Yngojo, and Step Afrika! Read some of their guest book entries.
Location
The unique waterfront setting of the Artist Retreat and Conference Center offers an inspirational setting for artists and non-profit leaders to benefit from the quiet repose and beauty of the Eastern Shore, allowing artists to focus solely on the creation of new work and non-profit leaders to refuel and devise new ideas and strategies.
Value
By bringing artists together from diverse backgrounds, artist retreats nurture collaborative, cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary works that add a unique dimension to our country’s culture.
The value of artist retreat centers is well-documented. Artist residencies at legendary sites such as MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, Millay Colony resulted in work by visual artists such as Georgia O’Keefe, Edward Hopper and Alexander Calder, musician-composers Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein and Bob Dylan, poets Gwendolyn Brooks, Langston Hughes, and Sylvia Plath, playwrights Edward Albee and Thornton Wilder, and novelists James Baldwin, Willa Cather, Alice Walker, and I.M. Pei.
Another expected outcome will be the facilitation of art exhibits, readings, and the premiering of new works at major concert halls and theaters in Maryland and other public venues; the release of new recordings or songs and symphonies, the publishing of novels, plays, children’s books, and other creations.
