Lexington & Munroe

The Town of Lexington granted use of its surplussed school building to Lexington artists and arts educators in 1984 with the understanding that the artists' mission would include returning community service to the town.

According to a 2005 in-house survey, Munroe Center's programs employ on a yearly basis nearly 100 Lexington residents as teachers and counselors.and provide arts education for 1,816 Lexington residents of all ages.

The Munroe Center provides below-market studio space for its studio artists. When studio space becomes available, Lexington artists are given priority. Six of the eleven current artists live in Lexington, while a seventh recently moved from Lexington to faculty housing in Boston.

Munroe schools and artists continue to bring free craft-making and performances to Lexington's Patriot's Day Parade, the Michelson's Discovery Day and Halloween event, the Bridge School's Art Walk and the Farmer's Market. It has sponsored, produced, and performed dance, theater, and concerts in Lexington's churches, Cary Hall, and the towns' greens. Munroe artists actively exhibit their work nationally, and locally, at the Depot Square Gallery and in the town center's public spaces.

In recent years, Munroe schools and artists participated in the Lexington Center Art Walk, the Historical society's Munroe Hill House Tour, and Cary Library's Bhutan Week, the Genesis Battlegreen Run, World's Largest Book (Cary Library), town business art exhibitions, Munroe has housed LABB's special needs classes and has continued to support special needs students in its programming. Munroe has provided meeting space for the Bnot Torah religious study group for the last two years. The Lexington Music Series' proceeds go to Project STEP, a string instrument and music education program for students of color.

Additionally, Munroe Center for the Arts continually throws open its doors for its annual Open House and Open Studios, free worshops, as well as constant free recitals and concerts. Its art gallery, newly extended, is free and open daily, and often sponsors shows by local artists. Its new Student's Gallery shows off work by participants in the ArtSpan program. ArtSpan curated a show of its children's summer program this year at the Cary Library.

Munroe Schools and Artists have numerous upcoming events in Lexington, including taking the lead with the Lexington Arts & Crafts Society and the Lexington Chamber of Commerce in creating a townwide Art Walk in the spring of 2008.