Q&A with Barnaby Evans // Founder and Executive Artistic Director // WaterFire Providence www.waterfire.org
How does art transform environments and shift minds and hearts?
Art and beauty present new and surprising opportunities to understand our world and surroundings. Artists see things in unexpected ways that can delight and surprise us into realizing new potential all around us. Modern environments can become too similar the world over. In Providence, a strong sense of the historic past with an adventurous young perspective that relishes the new produces excitement and freshness. Presenting the impossibility of fire and water in graceful, balanced co-existence, the WaterFire experience takes on aspects of the sacred, but in an atmosphere of adventure and festival.
It’s been 23 years and counting, what does WaterFire mean to you and Providence today?
WaterFire is the symbol of the renaissance of Providence. Twenty-three years ago, we uncovered the rivers at the heart of the city’s historic port and created a series of new city parks and building sites. I created WaterFire to celebrate and emphasize this new beginning. With those building sites now developed, the city attracts millions of visitors intrigued with its historic architecture, cultural vitality and rich culinary treasures. As a critical part of this renaissance, WaterFire established Providence as a destination city, representing transformation, the unexpected and renewal.
What can groups learn from WaterFire?
We all need the value of seeing things in new ways. The unexpected can be invaluable for problem-solving. Deep involvement in the moment is a gracious, even intoxicating experience. There is romance in discovery and the power of metaphor. Beauty itself gives us new insights, and artists involve all your senses and many of your memories. WaterFire allows the visitor great freedom in the moment to wander and discover what they will. Deliberately eclectic, much of the music will be new to visitors. All of this creates valuable newness in the urban experience.