Story
The spark Watsonville Brilliante that ignited our founder Kathleen Crocetti began when she was a pre-teen playing in ancient ruins that contained mosaics in Baia, an agricultural suburb outside of Naples, Italy.
Decades later after honing her art practice and spending a 30-year career as an art teacher Kathleen had the opportunity to spend 10 days in Barcelona Spain immersing herself in everything mosaics the Goudi had produced in his short lifetime.
That trip of a lifetime inspired Kathleen to take her years of experience as an art teacher and her dream of creating a monumental art piece for the City of Watsonville turning it into her retirement plan: Open a free mosaic art center for teens and have those teens create a monumental work of art for their town.
The white paper plan for Watsonville Brillante took 2 years to complete and can be accessed at this link for curious people. The original plan to cover the Watsonville Civic parking garage with 12,500 square feet of tiles estimated that the total cost would be 1.5 million and would take 5 years to complete. To make the project a reality the nonprofit organization Community Arts and Empowerment (CA&E) was established and a board of directors has overseen the organization and its projects since the spring of 2019.
On-time and within Budget!
The first tile for Watsonville Brillante was placed in September of 2019 and in spite of COVID and other delays along the way, the final installation is taking place 5 years later in September of 2024.
The budget grew substantially From the original projection of 1.5 million to 2.2 million when a paid intern program was established. Watsonville Brilliante has been funded almost entirely through private donations. The City of Watsonville has leased the Muzzio Mosaic Arts Center to Community Arts and Empowerment (the non-profit organization established to support Watsonville Brillante) for $1 a year this donation on the part of the City is valued at $300,000 donation, however, the Muzzio had sat largely unused for over 10 years before Community Arts and Empowerment occupied the space because the City did not have funding for programming. In addition to the Monumental Mosaic the City of Watsonville is receiving CA&E providing programming for youth at the Muzzio Mosaic Art Center through the work of CA&E. The value of youth programming at the Muzzio Mosaic Arts Center is estimated to be $200,000 a year between salaries, utilities, insurance, and programming costs. CA&E received one grant from the Arts Council of Santa Cruz for $2,000 representing less than 1% of the total budget.
Significant donations to the project have come in the form of business partnerships. Rinaldi Tile and Marble based out of Pajaro has donated all of the installation labor. Fireclay a B-certified Corporation with a factory in Aromas has provided 80% of the tiles and the remainder of the tiles have come from Daltile. All installation materials from the waterproofing membrane to thin-set grout and tile sealer are Laticrete products that have been 100% donated. The combined value of these in-kind donations is estimated to be $900,000. These Partnerships would not have been possible without the connections and generosity of Rick Rinaldi and his parents Yvonne and Gino Rinaldi Sr.
A business, even a nonprofit one requires cash to pay payroll, insurance, utilities, and other operational costs. CA&E was supported by seven Angel donors who each gave us $20,000 a year over 5 years. Additional smaller donations have come in over our 5-year period of operation and we are particularly grateful to those who give what they can in support of our dreams.
Artists and Images
Kathleen is an artist in her own right; however, her vision for Watsonvlle Brillante has always been to build and empower the community through the arts. To that end, Kathleen wanted local artists to be the designers, her job was to oversee the translation and fabrication of these designs into mosaics.
Kathleen understood that with so many designers from different cultural backgrounds and aesthetic training, the overall effect could be chaotic. She, therefore, planned to have the large vertical designs all be created by one artist. She wanted the images to be bold, black and white images that could provide a visual rest from the variety of patterns and colors planned for the horizontal sections. The obvious choice for these vertical images was Juan Fuentes, a 1969 graduate of Watsonville High School who had achieved his own acclaim through his four-and-a-half decades-long career in printmaking and his print studio “Pajaro Editions” in the Mission District of San Francisco. Juan’s images, “The Mayan Warrior ( The Strawberry Picker), “en el Cielo” (The Apple PIcker), “Heranita”, and “In the Garden” (The Asian Flower Grower) each tell a story about the agricultural roots fo Watsonville. Curious folks can follow this link to read more about Juan Fuentes and his images for Watsonville Brillante.
The horizontal images are meant to represent the cultural heritages of past and present residents of Watsonville. The designs were created by 120 local artists, 105 of whom were high school students when they submitted their designs. The initial call to artists was open for a year with only 5 entries when Kathleen decided to include youth artists in the design portion of the project. After enlisting the help of local art teachers CA&E received 390 entries from 345 individuals. Youth were asked to design from their own cultural backgrounds by studying cultural artifacts from their homes, specific suggestions were to look at textiles and pottery for inspiration to create distinct patterns. We discouraged the use of flags in the designs and were specifically looking for cultural patterns. We recognize that some artists did not follow our instructions. Our process was open and transparent, we sought community input at all stages of the design. We sincerely apologize to anyone who feels mis or underrepresented. Please follow this link to see the list of cultures and further links to read the artist statements submitted by the artists.
There are 185 horizontal spaces to fill, with only 120 identified cultures there was room to represent some of the mixed cultures that residents have told us about. The mixed culture designs were created by combining the designs of two or more artists. Follow this link to identify the mixed cultures we represented.
Second Sunday Tours
Every Second Sunday of the month, Kathleen or one of our interns hosts a tour of Watsonville Brillante. These 40-minute tours provide in-depth details, poignant stories, and an opportunity to ask questions. We meet at noon in front of the library, 275 Main Street. All are welcome, no reservations or advanced notice is needed.