Today we’d like to introduce you to Heather Doyle.
Hi Heather, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Heather Doyle, Artistic Director, is one of the six co-founders of the Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center, and has been a maker for as long as she can remember. She grew up in a house that was constantly under construction – solving problems, engineering solutions, and coming up with new projects was her norm.
She and Victoria – CAFAC’s Executive Director – first started working together at Minneapolis Community & Technical College (MCTC), offering sculptural welding and blacksmithing classes through the Continuing Education department. Although MCTC was a fantastic resource for learners, students consistently expressed an interest in continuing to practice their skills and create new work – capacity that MCTC didn’t have. There was a clear need for a new space to help provide access to the fire arts.
At the same time, the community in Heather and Victoria’s neighborhood was having discussions about how to bring resources to the area around 38th Street and Chicago Ave. They saw an opportunity to meet two needs: By creating a new arts center at 38th and Chicago, Heather and Victoria could help bring new opportunities to an important community commercial node, while providing a safe, well-equipped space for artists and learners to practice and build new skills.
After a small-but-mighty garage sale fundraiser, Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center officially became a nonprofit, and in 2008 purchased an old auto body shop at 38th and Chicago that would become the main CAFAC shop. Almost 20 years later, CAFAC is a fixture in South Minneapolis that supports all kinds of art produced by heat, spark, or flame, including blacksmithing, welding, metal casting, enameling, jewelry, glass, neon, and more. Along with serving more than 1000 adult learners every year, CAFAC has partnered with multiple community organizations to offer tailored learning experiences and has worked with local youth to create meaningful public art projects through the SPEAK Project. CAFAC has also collaborated with artists and organizations to design, manage, and fabricate over 50 public art projects; hosted dozens of exhibits in our storefront gallery; and most recently, launched a residency program to provide access to training and supported career development to local artists.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
The Chicago Avenue Fire Arts Center has always been a small, scrappy organization. From the very beginning, since we funded our application for nonprofit status with a garage sale, we’ve counted on committed volunteers to help with facility renovations, manage the shop space, and offer administrative support.
It’s taken years to build up our resources to be able to hire paid staff with competitive pay, and we now have a small staff team of five that works collaboratively on every part of CAFAC’s operations. Even today, most of our staff works part-time and has multiple responsibilities outside of their commitments to CAFAC, from parenting to working as independent artists and contractors. As we’ve grown, so have our resources and our capabilities as a hub for artist and community support in South Minneapolis.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Heather has dipped her toes into nearly every aspect of public art, including ideation and concepting, engineering and lighting design, materials sourcing, fabrication, installation, and maintenance. As an artist, she understands how difficult it can be to break into the field, and is proud of the inroads she and CAFAC have made into making the public art scene in Minnesota more accessible. Along with lowering financial and space barriers by providing, a safe, well-equipped studio, CAFAC makes a concerted effort to provide public art opportunities to people of underrepresented gender and racial identities. The majority of projects supported by CAFAC have been created by underrepresented artists and have an eye on social and environmental justice issues. Heather and the rest of CAFAC’s staff have been working to take this one step further, with a tailored public art residency program that will offer early-career artists training, shop space, logistical support, and feedback to help them break into the field.
Community-building has been a key part of CAFAC’s work, stemming from the organization’s beginnings as a grassroots, neighborhood initiative. No matter how much the organization has grown, Heather and CAFAC’s staff team hold on to that sense of community as the core of their work, and allow it to inform every aspect of their work – including community education partnerships, artist residencies and studio support, collaborative neighborhood events, and gallery exhibit opportunities.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://cafac.org
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/fireartscenter
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/cafacmn
