SPOTLIGHT: Palenke Arts

Art for All

Palenke Arts reaches people who might not

otherwise have a chance to participate in the arts.

By Sloan Campi

How do you build a local arts community outside of the boho mecca of Carmel-by-the-Sea? Ask Juan Sanchez, executive director and founder of Palenke Arts. What began

as a grassroots movement in Seaside is now in its 10th school year as a nonprofit, with two physical spaces and a third underway.

According to its mission statement, Palenke Arts provides a space that does not exist elsewhere. Sanchez saw the need and decided to find a way to educate, inspire and transform the community through the arts.

“We’re trying to bridge this gap between haves and have-nots and do it in a way that’s culturally sensitive,” says Sanchez, explaining that the endeavor requires something beyond a traditional arts curriculum.

In the past year, Palenke played host to over two dozen concerts and festivals. The Palenke Arts Center offers 21 classes, operating out of a repurposed locker room at Dr. Martin

Luther King, Jr. School of the Arts. Their second site, the Palenke Teen Arts Center, expands those offerings to 10 classes and five workshops in leadership, music, audio production, film and photography and more.

But classes and workshops are the tip of the iceberg. To Sanchez, it’s part of achieving something bigger: creating a culturally safe sanctuary for the people of Seaside to feel warm and welcome.

“The feeling is, ‘I’m OK here,’” Sanchez says. “One of our teens says, ‘This is my place of refuge.’”

There is a dream yet to realize: to build an arts center at Seaside High School. A 25,000-square-foot lot on Seaside High’s campus is the canvas that could soon offer a dedicated theater space plus a dance studio, music rehearsal studios and visual and digital arts studios for students. “The idea is to consolidate all the work that we’re doing and add a key piece that does not exist in the art community,” Sanchez says. In April, the board of

Monterey Peninsula Unified School District approved a lease to Palenke of the ground for $1 a year. Next, they have to build it.

Sanchez acknowledges that this is an important time for arts in the Seaside community, particularly for immigrants. “Our arts center is not just an arts center. We are a place of gathering, healing and economic development,” he says. “We use the arts as our medium for that.”