Yesterday A beloved building, an arts center “The Moose Exchange” burned. It is a major loss to the town of Bloomsburg, Pa., and more specifically, the arts community. Many artists lost studios and more importantly all of their original art. The building itself was an architectural gem with an ART Deco bar and interior deco details, and even a working 1950s bowling alley. The building has been evolving into a diverse cultural facility with public lectures, musical programs, art shows, craft and farmers markets, so when I say the loss is extreme I don’t have the right words to express how sorry I am for all of the devastation. Yesterday as word of the fire spread, I was notified by a friend to get down to the facility, as I had twenty-three framed photos from my Amish/ Mennonite works there as an exhibition hanging in the art center lobby. The exhibition was to hang throughout the month of January with a reception to be held this evening for myself and another artist, and then it would then merge with the other two thirds of the photos from the larger exhibition and travel to hang at the State Capitol Rotunda in March. I arrived to the scene you see in the photo. I watched the firefighters try to contain the fire and stood by watching artists realize that their work was gone. Many cried. We all stood helpless along with many town folk who watched in utter horror. I left feeling terrible, but mostly for the others who work was lost and now irreplaceable. As for me I thought that since my images were photos I could reprint and reframe, so while feeling down not as bad as most.
Late today I drove passed the burnt building and stopped to talk to the buildings director and others who had gathered there throughout the day to start planning and deciding on what comes next. I was told that late yesterday after the fire was out fireman went in and carried out some things that remained. My twenty-three photos were intact. They are smoky and reek of the fire but did not burn. They brought them across the street to our local photography store. I am in utter amazement that they survived. How I will never know as the amount of smoke and water that poured in and out of that building was immense. I would have taken a million dollar bet that they were destroyed. I’m not sure what they will need to have done to them to bring them back to show quality, but as I stood there in amazement I went back to all the other losses and hope in my heart, there’s a few more miracles waiting for other artists, and that as the phrase goes, that the arts center “will rise again from the ashes.” Say a little prayer and thanks no one was injured.