Fine Arts Center for the New River Valley

Our Mission

Believing that art is vital to the life of a community, our purpose is to foster an enjoyment, appreciation, and understanding of all forms of art, promote art education, and to encourage and support artists from the NRV and beyond.

We do this with a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. We seek to be a place of belonging and to provide equitable opportunities and access to the Fine Arts for all people.

Our History

The Fine Arts Center was created in 1978 out of a need to augment the arts education offered in the school systems and to provide a vehicle for the arts presentation to the residents of the New River Valley.  In 2019, the Board of Directors approved the naming of the art gallery in the Center after one of the Fine Arts Center’s founders, Mrs. Edna Love.  We are grateful for the legacy of art education, appreciation, promotion, and generous sharing that Edna Love created throughout her career as an artist and teacher, benefiting so many in the New River Valley.

2024 marks our 46th year of continuous arts enrichment for the New River Valley and beyond.

Our Programs

The Fine Arts Center strives to make the visual and performing arts an integral part of the life of our community by:

• Enriching Community life by promoting involvement and excellence in the arts
• Exhibiting the work of local and regional artists - for sale in the gift shop as well as through our gallery 
• Providing art education and instruction in a wide variety of media for young children, youth, and adults of all ages
• Presenting quality visual art exhibitions and musical performances 
• Hosting the annual Scholastic Award for Young Artists and Writers for Southwest Virginia
• Sponsoring Youth Art Month each March showcasing student art from around the New River Valley
  
  

Our Impact

In its 46 years of operation, the Fine Arts Center has touched the lives of an estimated 900,000 people through classes, gallery visits, performances, and special events.  The Center has hosted a combination of more than 5,500 classes or programs involving 30,000 plus artists.

Our Support

The Fine Arts Center operates through generous support from contributions, grants, and memberships. The Center is governed by an all-volunteer Board of Directors, many of whom are community art or art education professionals. With two paid (part-time) staff members, we rely heavily on the efforts of volunteers to fulfill its mission.  Sponsors of the Center’s many activities include the Virginia Commission for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, Town of Pulaski, Pulaski County, Community Foundation of the NRV, C.E. Richardson Benevolent Foundation, the Randolph House of Pulaski Foundation, and many individual sponsors.  We are grateful for their continued support.