A few months ago, I sat down with Free Times writer Ben Culbreth at a rickety table in Cool Beans and offered up a daunting task: write a story that seeks to answer the age-old question of this city’s identity.
“Who are we? Where are we going?” I asked him. Neither of us knew the answer. Not sure there is one, but there’s meaning in the quest to try to find them.
Hence this week’s series of stories, The Identity Issue, which are anchored around this nebulous quest to define, explore and understand the many facets of creativity in Columbia.
Picture the arts scene like a house.
The Free Times 2024 Identity Issue: The hunt for Columbia's arts identity.
There’s the entryway — accessible venues and festivals that showcase talent on a large stage. That could be St. Pats in Five Points, the Columbia Museum of Art or a TikTok gone viral.
Move into the living room and the kitchen to find the hubs of creative commerce — galleries and restaurants and bars and stages that consistently put out work, food, music and more. There’s jazz music, Asian fusion eateries, artist pop-ups and new businesses to be found, to visit and to connect with the arts through.
But explore the nooks and crannies of the house to find the new, the now, the next of culture.
The basement hosts DIY concerts, back room raves and genre-shattering productions that allow for hungry new talent to emerge, to discover themselves and to showcase what could be.
A rooftop terrace (this is a boujee Arsenal Hill home) hosts the high-brow events, where wealthy patrons and technically advanced artists push the city forward as a destination and an investment.
And meet me out back, where the outdoors offer something vital — public spaces for rest and recreation.
So if you want to join Free Times on this quest, take the stairs.
Climb through windows and peek behind closed doors to find what creativity is blooming in the corners of Columbia. It’s not as easy as plopping on the couch and finding a familiar favorite, but there are wonders in the discomfort and there are wonders in our home — our community — waiting for you to find them.
Come back to free-times.com through Feb. 16 to find all the stories in the Identity Issue. The print version hits newsstands across the Midlands on Wednesday, Feb. 14.
