Friday, Feb. 23, 2007 | 7:06 a.m.
Anyone who has meandered the Arts District during the daytime has probably walked away wondering, "Why isn't anything open?"
Some galleries are open. Some are closed. A few downtown Las Vegas business owners came up with a brilliant solution: togetherness.
They're forming Downtown Retailers Artwalk, which will be known by the acronym DRAW.
The plan is to have a group of area businesses that will agree to open their doors Thursday through Saturday, with extended hours on Thursday and Friday evenings.
Naomi Arin, owner of Dust Gallery, is president and Jack Solomon, owner of S2 Art, is vice president. Membership fees would go toward marketing efforts to draw tourists into the Arts District.
"We're trying to get businesses to be consistent in the hours that they're open. If we can do that we can advertise together," Arin says.
"The goal is to bring tourists downtown. To do that we have to be open."
It also brings attention to the 18-block district on days that are not First Friday.
For Solomon, it fills his desire for a focused art event: "We want to have a serious artwalk," Solomon says. "Not a party for the whole city."
CCSN merges art department
CCSN's art and art history department will disappear in July, which has some local culturati up in arms.
Because it didn't have enough students, the department and its nine instructors and four staff members will be merged with another department for the fall semester, officials say. Students can still take the same art and art history classes and receive the same degree.
Changes came when CCSN President Richard Carpenter began making administrative changes to reduce its number of departments: "It was top heavy," says Carlos Campo, dean of the of arts and letters division.
Several departments were merged immediately. But because the art and art history department was so close in meeting its numbers, it was put on probation for a year, rather than merged. The number of students required per semester is 1,850. JoAnne Vuillemot, art professor and department chairwoman, says the department was about 100 students shy of that number.
But CCSN spokeswoman Helen Clougherty says the decision had nothing to do with student numbers. "We can't justify a stipend to a chair for eight faculty members. The only thing being eliminated is professor Vuillemot's stipend."
Campo says the visual art program will still have its own budget. The decision to merge the department has caused a swarm of murmurs by cultural players and school faculty who fear it will take away bargaining power for arts programs.
"It is a serious blow to the prestige of the arts in Southern Nevada," says Patrick Gaffey, cultural program supervisor for Clark County. "Since I started working here in the arts in 1981, the college has been a major player, has presented important exhibits and has brought numbers of important artists to this community.
"For our community college to lose its art department just as the community is beginning to realize the importance of the arts, and public art is beginning to surge, is a harmful step backward."
Vuillemot, who has been with CCSN since 1976, says the department members will be able to recommend which department it would like to move into.
Clougherty says the department is being rolled into the department of performing arts and that this was communicated to the faculty a year ago.
Vuillemot says she's disappointed: "We made really strong arguments to continue the department. It definitely is a setback when you're under people who don't have the same discipline."
Both Vuillemot and Campo say the lack of studio space influenced the low number of students.
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