Written By Sherwood Kohn
In the wake of all the wailing and gnashing of teeth that took place when the Ravens left town, everyone seems to have forgotten that Carroll County has the ability – if it has the will – to replace the sports economic engine with something not only more permanent but potentially more prestigious and inclusive: a festival of the arts.
All of the assets save two are already in place. Westminster has rich cultural assets: an Arts Council and Center, a Fall Fest, a wine festival, an annual Common Ground on the Hill music series and a number of other musical events, including orchestral, choral and bell-ringing concerts.
In addition, the county is host to a microbrewery festival and various firehouse-sponsored carnivals, as well as being home to numerous professional musicians, artists and craftsmen.
And then there are two vibrant institutions of culture and higher education: McDaniel College and Carroll Community College, plus the Ag Center and the Farm Museum – four anchors for the county’s intellectual, creative and social well-being.
The only elements lacking are an organization that can bring all the arts together for a week or weekend, and the seed money to support such an effort.
Given those admittedly difficult-to-find components, Carroll County could stage what Baltimore already has: an Artscape-type festival that would attract not only money – in the form of local patronage – but statewide and perhaps national significance.
Maryland already has crab festivals, oyster roasts, a regatta and a world-class symphony orchestra, as well as live theaters, the Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia and a smattering of film festivals.
But all of those assets are scattered. It seems to me that we have a creative nucleus in Carroll County that can serve to draw them together as a nexus of a celebration of the arts.
And where the arts are celebrated, prosperity often follows.
