The inaugural “SPARC Week”is going strong in the Bronx and around the city. “SPARC” – Seniors Partnering with Artists Citywide – is a community arts engagement program that places artists-in-residence at senior centers across the five boroughs of New York City to provide arts programs for older adults.
In the Bronx, a performance of Bomba dance by seniors participating in Melinda Gonzalez’s SPARC program took place on Monday at Casa Boricua on East 172nd Street and a choral concert by seniors in SPARC artist Ellen Bardekov’s program who held at Bronx House on Tuesday morning. A poetry and creative writing presentation will be held Friday at 1:00 p.m. at JASA Dreiser Senior Center in Coop City featuring participants in Lorraine Currelley’s SPARC program.
SPARC has three primary goals: (i) to positively impact the quality of life of the City’s older adults through direct engagement in arts and cultural activities; (ii) to reinvigorate neighborhood senior centers as vital community spaces through increased cultural programming and events; and (iii) to increase opportunities for arts residencies and access to workspace for artists in a City where affordable space is limited. SPARC Week is intended to further these goals, inviting the public into senior centers to engage the work of the SPARC participants, strengthening ties between senior centers and their communities and enlivening them as neighborhood hubs.
SPARC programming in the Bronx is a collaboration between the Department of Cultural Affairs, the Department for the Aging and the Bronx Council on the Arts.
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