Driving past the old Brandon House furniture building in Little Rock on her way to graduate school classes, Dr. Patrice Bax dreamed about the opportunities that could be offered inside.
Bax knew that various modes of art to express feelings and share experiences could be life-altering for kids, especially those at-risk.
Brandon House Cultural Center may not be in the location where Bax originally imagined, but it provides spaces for children and adults alike to learn and create things they may not have even realized possible, just like she had hoped.
Bax and her parents, Dr. Pamela and Paul Bax, and her brother, Dion Bax, founded Brandon House Cultural and Performing Arts Center in 2010.
One of their pilot programs was DreamStarters, which began in 2016 at a charter school. Through DreamStarters, students ages 6 to 11, get to learn about visual arts and music through lessons infused with reading comprehension, math and science.
“The Dream Starters program really takes time to expose kids to all types of art, so they can explore where their talent is. It gives them a taste of what it is to be in the realm of being an artist and creating art,” said Bax.
DreamStarters meets after school in a small house on 12th Street, but soon that program will be relocated to Brandon House’s suite of facilities further west, on Colonel Glenn, where the organization expanded a couple of years ago. The relocation will allow them to raise the enrollment capacity for DreamStarters, just as the new digs have allowed the organization to grow its offerings beyond the original creative program that focused on youth.
“The expansion has allowed us to branch out. We can do more programming and meet the needs of our artists and creative professional community as well,” said Bax. “It allowed us to have our own production suite. We have a photography lab, video editing suite, podcasting station, music studio, vocal booth, a media lab, and then also an event space. We also have a theater, a dance hall, another production studio for choir and band rehearsals, a café area, art gallery and an art lab and a gift shop.”
The pandemic, of course, put a hold on face-to-face instruction for a while, and the pause gave Brandon House’s staff an opportunity to “think through some new things,” according to Bax. This “re-thinking” led to the plans for career and workforce training along with creative services for small businesses.
“We started with just creative programs, but it birthed a whole other area of service and support that we offer to the community,” said Bax. “We want to serve the community in general, but we had to pace ourselves in how we did it.”
Brandon House leaders are also considering new ways to generate revenue for the organization.
Their newly-opened event space, for example, is available for public use, and they offer services to artists, musicians and other creative professionals, including marketing, branding and promotions.
“Half of our team is split between my contracted staff who have those experiences and programming staff, those who work with youth,” said Bax.
The production suite, where vibrant murals painted by local artist Jose Hernandez, color the walls of hallways and pods. It contains spaces for a gaming system and a media editing suite, a podcast space and a photography pod. Across the hall is a vocal booth, where students can learn the ins and outs of audio production.
“What I’ve seen is the opportunity to kind of [allow students] to just be themselves,” Bax said of the kids who come to Brandon House. “It’s a fun space, and they get a chance to learn. We never pressure anyone to stick to one thing, which is why we have different activities every day.”
Kids arrive for afternoon activities at 4:30 p.m.
“I like creating music, and I like taking pictures of things,” said Destiny Jeffries, 12, during a recent session. “I like cityscapes, especially.”
Her friend, Rayleigh Ashford, 11, has not yet decided what activity she likes most.
“I like to check out everything,” she said.
That kind of exploration is encouraged, Bax said. The students who come after school and during the summer get a chance to dabble in various types of arts to see what sparks their interest. The lessons learned through Brandon House are intended to give them a way to process how they see their surroundings and, eventually, to find a voice or outlet to share their thoughts and opinions with the world.
“We cooked and made videos, and we made a podcast,” said Rayleigh.
Making podcasts involves making decisions about what topics to cover, what to call the show, and who to interview.
“For one podcast we interviewed each other — and we would just talk on the show about music and other stuff,” said Destiny.
“The thing I want to focus on is acting,” said Jordin Walden, 12. “I really like acting, and I have drama in school.”
Jordin has participated in Brandon House’s drama program, “Act Out,” as well as “Youth Voices Impact Change.” The latter pairs teens with adults who can guide them in creative expressions about social concerns, using multi-digital media and mixed art.
“I think all in all, kids come out with a better perception of themselves,” Bax said. “And they find a place where they feel accepted for who they are.”
Tony Anderson, Brandon House’s producer, is a chef, and manages the organization’s new artistic café. He leads Monday afternoon’s “Let’s Eat” classes, which include conversations about nutritional facts and tips for safe preparation.
“Sometimes I’m learning new things, and I’ll teach the kids the new things,” said Anderson. “We give them the freedom to be creative. Like yesterday we did charcuterie boards. I gave them a variety of ingredients and gave them a template and told them to go from there.”
He sometimes assigns a theme and lets kids prepare meals that dovetail with those themes. For example, a game night theme might mean serving pizza or sliders.
There is a “Fall In” event at Brandon House every other weekend, giving students who are not a part of the after-school activities an opportunity to “fall in” to activities outside the school week.
“Our large events space is one of our best assets,” Bax said. “It gives us a chance to open our space to the community and also to showcase the work that we’ve done with students and local artists.”
In the future, our café area will be a place for single-stage events or open-mic events.
“We have a saxophonist and when he wants to do a jazz show or something he can do that in here,” Bax said.
There is a majorette dance team at Brandon House, and a choreographer will coordinate fee-based dance classes.
Allan Boston might be one of Brandon House’s strongest supporters. Boston found his way to Brandon House while he was in high school, through what was then a pilot program called “I Have Unique Skills to Learn and Earn” (iHustle).
“After growing up where I did and where I went to school, I was like, ‘I am not going to get tied up with any of this.’ I started doing things at Brandon House and I never wanted to leave. I still don’t want to leave,” said Boston. “We introduce kids to graphic design, multimedia artistry, podcasting, videography, cinematography, photography, personal branding…among other things. We all had an opportunity to try. I went because I had a dream of being a photographer.”
As a student, Boston was surprised when Bax handed him a camera and ushered him off with instructions to take video and photographs of an event, and he rose to the occasion.
Boston helped recruit other teens to iHustle, and together they made a video to promote the organization’s Arts Over Tobacco initiative, encouraging kids to turn their focus from nicotine to creativity. That video led to other videos for other purposes, which spawned further opportunities. Boston built his confidence and his skills through Brandon House, and now he shares his knowledge with the students who are coming up behind him.
Almost seven years after he first arrived at Brandon House, Boston is on staff as videographer and event center auxiliary support.
Through Brandon House’s programs, he said, he learned about accountability, punctuality and how to work with a team as well as some of the skills that brought him there in the first place.
“I hope I’ve made a notable mark here at Brandon House,” he said. “They granted me opportunity after opportunity. I’m trying to give them a decade and then a decade more.”