Courtesy / Waterville Creates!
Andrew Silsby, left, president and CEO of Kennebec Savings Bank, and Jim LaLiberty, board chairman of Waterville Creates!, celebrate the bank's donation to the art center campaign.
July 16, 2019
Kennebec Savings donates $100K to arts center planned in Waterville
Courtesy / Waterville Creates!
A rendering of the planned Paul J. Schupf Art Center in downtown Waterville.
By Staff
Waterville Creates! has received a gift of $100,000 from Kennebec Savings Bank in support of the community capital campaign for the planned Paul J. Schupf Art Center.
In recognition of the leadership gift, one of the cinemas proposed for the center will be named the Kennebec Savings Bank Screening Room, according to a news release.
Waterville Creates! is a nonprofit promoting high-quality, accessible arts and cultural programs and institutions in Waterville.
The Paul J. Schupf Art Center will be constructed on the current site of The Center building at 93 Main St., adjacent to the Waterville Opera House, City Hall and downtown’s central green space, Castonguay Square. The center will be designed to bring together under one roof some of Waterville’s arts institutions, including the Maine Film Center, Common Street Arts and a new gallery of the Colby Museum of Art.
Waterville Creates! and Colby College are partnering on the center, which will be designed as a hub for visual arts, performing arts, arts education and film for children and adults.
The new facility is also expected to add vitality to downtown Waterville and serve as an economic driver for the region.
“Our roots run deep in Waterville, and we recognize just how important this new arts center will be to the region,” Andrew Silsby, president and CEO of Kennebec Savings Bank, said in the release. “We are proud to support and be a part of a collective vision to make Waterville a premier arts and culture destination.”
$18 million goal
Kennebec Savings Bank’s gift was pledged as a contribution to the $2 million community capital campaign led by Waterville Creates!
The overall fundraising goal for the project is $18 million.
The bank is also a lead capital campaign supporter of the Head of Falls and RiverWalk project in Waterville.
“Kennebec Savings Bank has consistently been a strong champion of the arts in our community through their sponsorship of the Waterville Opera House, the Maine International Film Festival, Waterville Rocks!, and more,” Shannon Haines, president and CEO of Waterville Creates!, said in the release.
Schupf is a Colby College trustee emeritus. In 2018, he donated $2 million for the contemporary art gallery that will be at the core of the art center. He made another donation in 2019 to support the construction of the 32,000-square-foot center, at 93 Main St. While Colby wouldn't say how much Schupf has donated, the project now has half of the $20 million needed to complete the project. The center is part of a $100 million investment the college has made in the downtown area.
In June, Waterville Creates! announced a gift of $25,000 from Northern Light Inland Hospital for the center.
A month earlier, actor Ed Harris donated $75,000 to the capital campaign. Harris, who worked and lived in Waterville in the early 2000s while filming the HBO movie "Empire Falls," cited his fondness for the people of Waterville as one reason for the gift, according to a news release.
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