As the result of a strategic planning process focused on capacity-building, long-term sustainability, and the transition from an artist-led improvisational activity into a cultural institution, WaterFire Providence purchased the Center in 2012 and began fundraising and rehabilitation for the vacant, historic, industrial building in the underserved Olneyville/Valley neighborhood of Providence. Initially built in 1929 for the US Rubber Company as a multi-purpose manufacturing facility, WaterFire Providence completed the renovation of the WaterFire Arts Center in May 2017. The 37,000 square foot multi-use arts center has become WaterFire’s first permanent home in the community.
The WaterFire Arts Center serves as our headquarters and multi-purpose arts venue as well as a social enterprise platform strengthening the organization’s long-term financial sustainability. One of the unique features of the WaterFire Arts Center is the Main Hall which provides 15,000 square feet of uninterrupted exhibition, performance, and production space with a 40-foot ceiling. Previous activities in the building have included the production and performance/exhibition of Megan and Murray McMillan’s Coal Bin Project (2013) which was featured in MassMoCA’s Explode Every Day: An Inquiry into the Phenomena of Wonder exhibition (2015), the 5 day Providence Fringe Festival (2017-210), The Rosa Parks House Project art installation by Ryan Mendoza (2018), and the To the Moon and Beyond: Celebrating the 50th-Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon Landing with Art, Science, and Exploration exhibition featuring Luke Jerram’s work Museum of the Moon (2019). In 2021 we hosted three major exhibitions of work from Rhode Island artists: Private Visions, Public Ideals – The Legacy of Howard Ben Tré, Down to Earth: Robert Rohm Sculpture, 1963-2013, and EYE TO EYE Photographs and Projects Mary Beth Meehan. In 2022, we produced an exhibition Planet Earth, the Environment and Our Future, centered around Luke Jeram’s Gaia.
