Have we seen the last LoLa Art Crawl?

After five years, a lack at the helm threatens its continuation

Organizers of past LoLa art crawls have announced that they will not be planning and administering an art crawl in 2015, citing other time commitments and priorities.

A few of the artists who have participated in the crawl have expressed an interest in stepping up to take the reins, but no plans have been made as of yet.

The art crawl requires hundreds of hours of volunteer time each year. For its first five years, artist and graphic designer Bob Schmitt served as art crawl administrator, overseeing the entire process, coordinating other volunteers, planning and chairing meetings, and serving as the primary contact person; he also created and managed the LoLa website and designed the logo and all printed materials.

When Schmitt stepped down as administrator after the 2013 event, a small group formed a committee to share administrative duties and organize the 2014 crawl. This included Anita White, Shirley Neilson, Laurie Letofsky, Sharon Parker, Aaron Lichtov and Brenda Peterson. This group raised the participation fees in order to hire a graphic designer to create the map. They also introduced online registration to streamline the process, and other innovations. Additional graphic design work was contributed by volunteers Lichtov and Parker. In the spring, White stepped away, citing health issues and the need to follow her artistic muse.

While sharing administrative duties was conceived as a way to spread the work around, it presented its own set of challenges, with no individual taking a leadership role or holding clear authority. Also, artist volunteers found that it interfered with finding time to work on their own art projects.

The LoLa art crawl, which has always been an all-volunteer event, first took place in August of 2009, with 42 artist participants at 20 sites throughout the greater Longfellow area. Participation peaked in 2013, when there were 155 artists at 89 locations. The 2014 art crawl featured 114 artists at 60 sites.

LoLa stands for League of Longfellow Artists, a term coined by Neilson at a meeting in the early summer of 2009 with Schmitt, White, and other local artists. It was formed as an artist-organized association dedicated to raising the visibility of local artists, and building a sense of community through art in greater Longfellow. For the purpose of the crawl, the greater Longfellow was defined as the area bordered by Cedar Ave. to the Mississippi River and E. 28th St. to the Crosstown. This is larger than the actual Greater Longfellow served by the Longfellow Community Council. It was defined so broadly in order to include co-founder Schmitt and other artists who reside outside of the official Longfellow boundaries.

LoLa has never had a formal structure or governing body, but has employed a non-elected ad hoc steering committee to plan and implement the annual art crawl, which has traditionally taken place on the last full weekend of August.

The Longfellow Community Council (LCC), which has been LoLa’s fiscal agent since 2011, has no plans to step in and intervene, but it invites those who would like to help continue the art crawl to join their Community Connections committee to discuss possible ways to work with other volunteers on the project.

“LCC views the LoLa art crawl as an asset to the community. It is our hope that other artists in the community are compelled to take on a leadership role and continue the annual event,” said Melanie Majors, executive director of LCC.

“LCC welcomes LoLa artists and other interested residents to join our Community Connections committee to discuss the potential for continuing the art crawl or other opportunities to share art with the community,” she added.

The committee meets the second Tuesday of the month, 6:30–8pm, at Longfellow Park. For more information about the committee, contact JoAnna Lund, joannalund@longfellow.org, or visit the LCC website, Longfellow.org. Artists in Longfellow can also connect with other artists in the community via the LoLa Facebook group, which can be found by entering “League of Longfellow Artists” into the Facebook search bar.