Village Center for the Arts: A Community Hub For Creativity in New Milford

Meet Jayson Roberts, the Executive Director of Village Center for the Arts (VCA), a vibrant non-profit arts center that has been nurturing creativity in New Milford, Connecticut, and the surrounding region for 25 years. What began as a simple endeavor to help his children with a drama program has blossomed into a multifaceted community asset.

🎭 A Passion Project Turned Community Cornerstone

Jayson’s journey into the arts world started humbly—as the “backstage dad” for his kids’ drama program. When the program needed a dedicated space, Jayson connected with a building slated for demolition, and with permission, he created a black box theater in 3,000 square feet of “vanilla box space”.

It quickly evolved as parents of the drama students, who were artists themselves, started using the space for activities like making wooden toys and giant puppets. This organic growth led to VCA’s founding in the fall of 2000. Jayson eventually retired from his 26-year career in the machine shop trade to dedicate himself fully to the arts center.

VCA is now located in an 1837 structure that was once a hardware store, providing a unique and historic backdrop for artistic expression.

🖌️ More Than Just Art Classes

Village Center for the Arts offers a wide variety of tactile, hands-on activities, making it truly unique in the area. They serve all ages, from three-year-olds to a 94-year-old in their senior classes, often reaching a wide range of ages on the same day.

Services include:

• Pottery Lessons and Hand-Building Classes in their two downstairs pottery studios.
• After-School Classes for grade-school children.
• An Extensive Summer Camp Program.
• Workshops and Fine Art Classes for both kids and adults.
• Open Studio Format where visitors can come in, be creative, and use the myriad of materials available for a studio fee.

VCA’s impact stretches geographically, attracting regular participants from about an hour away, including parts of New York state, and reaching as far north as the Massachusetts border. For special holiday events and their popular summer camp, they draw participants nationwide. Some families even rent a house for a month so their children can attend camp.

❤️ Giving Back and Changing Lives

For Jayson and the entire VCA organization, the core mission is giving back to the community. They focus on making art accessible to everyone and emphasize the value of changing lives every day.

The arts center is dedicated to making a difference through various initiatives:

• Scholarship Programs VCA has provided scholarships—partially or in full—to thousands of children for their programs and activities through grant writing and fundraising. They also run grant-funded programs, such as their Senior Clay program for those 60 and over.
• The Unexpected Artist Program This fantastic program allows any student to come in and complete art-related homework projects for free. They work with area schools to ensure students have a place to complete complex assignments, like a recent chemistry project that had students creating “mole” stuffed animals.

Jayson’s genuine, straightforward approach and the continuous effort of the organization have earned them a stellar reputation. In July, Jayson and his wife, Sharon, were presented with the prestigious Da Vinci Award in New Milford, an honor given to individuals who exemplify community service and the arts.

Jayson notes that the true evidence of their work is not an award, but “the evidence in the smiling kids, the kids that come in to do school projects here and get good grades, the kids that get out of their comfort zone trying something new”. After 25 years, they are now seeing second-generation participants—the children of their first students—coming to classes, a testament to the lasting impact of VCA.

Jayson, a New Milford native who considers the New Milford Green his “front yard,” is also an active community member, having served on the Commission on the Arts and currently on the Cultural Commission, supporting New Milford’s designation as a Cultural District.

Jayson and the Village Center for the Arts are always looking for people with a similar mindset of giving back to the community, whether through overall help or specific instruction and training in various media.

Website: www.villagecenterarts.org

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