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Date: 11/1/2022
HOLYOKE – After 40 years as executive/artistic director of the Enchanted Circle Theater, Priscilla Kane Hellweg is starting a new adventure. Hellweg retired from Enchanted Circle in December 2021 and has now officially launched her new consulting firm, The Arts Integration Studio.
“After 40 years of being an executive director/artistic director, it felt like it was a really wonderful time for me to reorganize what it was that I wanted to be doing,” said Hellweg.
The Arts Integration Studio is a creative makerspace designed to address critical needs in education, community health and the environment. The firm incorporates creativity, the arts and cultural engagement in collaboration with others to promote positive outcomes and sustainable solutions to pressing educational and social concerns.
“After all these years, I have a lot of contacts across many sectors in arts, education, social services, policymaking and curriculum development and I thought that the arts become this perfect integrator with everything. Whether it’s the environment, social justice, education – the arts are really at the center of all of it,” said Hellweg.
The firm’s main jobs will be in training, researching, producing and consulting.
This fall, the Arts Integration Studio will be partnering with four different entities. They will be working with Pittsfield Public Schools and Berkshire Educational Resources on professional development in arts integration and with Mount Holyoke Professional and Graduate Education Department on a graduate fellowship focused on producing research and publications on arts and learning.
They will also be working with the town of Longmeadow, Bay Path College and Deza Studios to produce a public art exhibit on climate despair, resilience and action as the town works to update their Master Municipal Plan and with the Treehouse Foundation which works to support families with children who have experienced foster care.
The Arts Integration Studio is also working to develop ARTS CORPS, a training program for college students and emerging teaching artists interested in the intersectionality of arts, education, social justice and community well-being.
According to Hellweg, she is extremely invested and involved in all of these projects.
“My grandmother used to say her children are like the fingers on her hand, she needs all of them. She loves them all. Personally, I’m invested in each one of these,” she said.
With this new business venture, Hellweg is excited about the new possibilities of arts integration and how quickly she can make an impact.
“One of the things I’m most excited about is how nimble I can be as the Principal Teaching Artist in the program. I’m bringing in collaborators, but as a small firm I’m able to make very exciting decisions very quickly,” she said.