The man with the arts portfolio Cliff Wood discusses Providence’s creative community and the search for the right balance BY IAN DONNIS

FROM TOUGH TIMES through Providence’s ascent as an increasingly desirable city in which to live, the arts have played a vital role by attracting visitors, stirring discussion, providing an outlet, and extending a broader sense of community. Perhaps just as impressive in the biggest city in the smallest state, there’s usually something for just about any taste — ranging from the artful drama of Trinity Rep to the unaffected dive bar offerings of the Safari Lounge. Continuing the mayoral tradition of recognizing this cornucopia as an economic asset, Cliff Wood, director of the Department of Arts, Culture, and Tourism, the point man for the Cicilline administration, finds much on his plate.

In many ways, Wood, a 35-year-old native of Schenectady, New York, personifies the kind of newcomers that have flocked to Providence in recent decades. Affable and politically savvy, he’s sufficiently nerdy to discuss urban planning with excitement, yet whimsical enough to turn up playing the sax on occasion during a downtown Thursday night jam session. As Providence’s arts czar, he considers himself fortunate and challenged by the issues before him.

Wood came to Providence in 1997 after meeting his wife, the peace activist Karina Holyoak Wood, while attending graduate school at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, and then living in Washington, DC. After working on downtown issues for Arnold "Buff" Chace’s Cornish Associates, and then as a campaign volunteer in 2002, Wood joined the Cicilline administration as deputy chief of policy, moving to his new role when the Department of Arts, Culture, and Tourism was created in November 2003.

We talked last week at tazza caffe on Westminster Street.

Q: What’s the most surprising thing you’ve learned since you’ve been in this job?

A: It’s a challenge and it’s also a blessing: how many people who are in this community that are affiliated one way or the next with arts and culture in Providence. From people who are full-time actors or rely on their art form to make a living as their sole source of income, to people who split their time between sort of being something during the day and being a fairly accomplished something else in the evening. And people who are patrons, who are truly lovers of the arts. They’re here in such big numbers, realizing their dreams, chasing their dreams, and it’s a real benefit to a city of our size to have all that.

The challenge is that we have people who are good enough to be anywhere, and they’re here, and we’re small here. We don’t have the corporate support that you have in some larger cities, so finding that balance, how to address all of those desires, how to make sure we can meet all those needs with 175,000 people [can be difficult]. I would defy anyone to find a city our size with the kind of things that we have here. I don’t think one exists, so that’s a big surprise.

Q: Providence has gained increased desirability as a place to live over the last 15 or so years, and partially as a result, real estate prices have really skyrocketed. Could you talk a little about how this has affected the arts community?

A: I’m really happy in that we have some great partnerships with some other organizations in the state and the city, working with Laura Mullen at Citizens for the Arts. Working with some of our partners in Pawtucket, my counterpart Herb [Weiss], and working with Randy [Rosenbaum] at the state level. This is a big issue.

First of all, in having heard from the arts community about this topic, understand that it’s not a monolith, that what an artist in Rhode Island [spans] everything. You may have your broke painter or musician in some loft somewhere, and you may have some really affluent photographers working so much that I see them every place. It’s pretty broad, frankly. While it’s certainly an issue, it’s one that we’re addressing in the city and also collectively with our partners. Not everyone has the same needs, and not everyone has the same resources, so you’re really talking about certain sectors — what’s happening in Olneyville. A lot of it’s tied into code issues, and how can we build spaces, like Puente. They’re trying to recreate that arts-community commune sort of collective spot a la AS220’s third floor.

So that is happening in different places, but now issues after the Station fire of code have complicated that a little bit. So being able to have those spaces be safe and legal is a priority, but having them be available is a priority, and that’s something we’re working through. Other people just need studio space, which is less problematic. So it’s an issue. An upside of that is, it has moved to different parts of town, so the conversation has really broadened, and we’re talking a lot about Olneyville, we’re talking a lot about other places.

Q: Speaking of Olneyville, almost a year has passed since about 60 people who were part of the thriving underground music scene were evicted from a building there. What has happened to the landlord of that building, the people who living there, and what’s your sense of the impact on the local music scene?

A: Totally anecdotal: the people that I was talking to in that building when that happened, they worked with our office and we tried to help them at least find some temporary locations and stuff. They’re still around. I mentioned Laura Mullen, who was a sort of unofficially involved person with that. Now she’s official [as an advocate for sustainable housing for artists]. So I meet with Laura a lot, and we talk about this. The people I talk to who came with her are still here. Brian [Chippendale of Lightning Bolt]’s still here. Ben [McOsker]’s label is doing really well. Spin’s doing an article on Providence and Load Records and all. I don’t think it as a "scene" has stopped us in Providence.

Individual stories will change, according to who you’re talking to. There were a lot of people in that building. I don’t know what happened to the guy who owns the joint. He didn’t come to court that day, and he lives in Massachusetts, so I don’t know what he’s doing with the space.