By Carl Atiya Swanson, Springboard for the Arts

Someone stops, unsure if they should be watching. Another person cranes their neck over a computer screen while still another buries their face in a book. The reactions are different, but in the end, applause breaks out. In 2013 we did a run of Library Acts of Culture through the Saint Paul Public Library System, to positive response from the surprised but mostly appreciative people who were there to see the performances. So when we had the opportunity to come back for a second round, we wanted to double down on the surprise, and find new ways to keep the performances popping up.

For our recent series of dates at the end of May, instead of traveling with a single act to a group of libraries, each of the three days of Library Acts of Culture was a double bill, juxtaposing the diverse artists living and working in the Twin Cities. The first round was Doo-Wop + Hip-Hop, with The Fairlanes, an a cappella quartet singing originals and classics, paired with All Day, a Hmong popping dance crew. The second day brought Strings Around the World, featuring the baroque voice and lute of Ladyslipper Ensemble paired with the Somali oud and spoken word poetry of Ka Joog. Finally, there was Birth + Roots, with the Americana folk songs of Martin Devaney and Jake Hyer alongside the contemporary dance of Maggie Bergeron & Company – featuring two very pregnant dancers!

The surprise of one act performing in a library is enough to attract attention, but two disparate acts back-to-back created even more buzz around the performance, and reminded people of the breadth of culture that exists in the Twin Cities. People got into one and stayed paying attention for the second, and the pairing formed new bonds between the artists as well as the library patrons. “A man came up to me and told me that he loves baroque music and that he is homeless and doesn’t get to hear such music, since he can’t go to concerts. He was so very appreciative,” said Sahar Hassan of Ladyslipper Ensemble. “It made me feel happy that we all made such a difference in people’s lives that day, which is what art should do, whether it’s music, poetry or dance.”

With the double-bill, we also wanted to work with specific ways to make sure that people would know that the pop-ups had happened, and keep reminding them that the library is a vital cultural space. Springboard for the Arts produced a live TV special for Twin Cities Public Television called TV Takeover (also supported by the Knight Foundation) and so we were able to include a Library Acts of Culture video there, broadcast out to the state and archived online as well.

In keeping with the Knight Foundation’s commitment to innovative digital media as a way to engage people, we have also partnered with a new app called Leav, to place these Library Acts of Culture videos in their ecosystem. Leav is a mobile platform for placing, viewing, and sharing digital art that is both shaped by, and linked to, the world around it. Our videos will be geotagged to the libraries themselves, and so users of the app will be able to access the videos specifically in the libraries where the performances happened – the pop-ups will pop up again!

Given the chance to experiment, Library Acts of Culture is shifting the library system itself. “We are already incorporating an acts of culture-like approach to some of our programming. What we were inspired by was programming in a different format, in non-traditional space in the library. I enjoyed seeing a wide range of reactions, particularly from patrons who may not have been interested in attending a longer, more formal performance,” noted Rebecca Ryan of the Saint Paul Public Library. “It reminds me what a rich community of artists we have in the Twin Cities with a wonderful variety of approaches. I see the acts of culture as a reminder to the library to shake things up, and continue to think creatively how artists and busy public spaces can be mixed and re-mixed.”

Like going back to re-read a favorite book and finding new meaning, introducing surprising performances and artists through the Library Acts of Culture sparks new reactions and understanding of what the space can be, and what the library can mean to us now.