Thomas Memorial Library’s Community Art Boxes display exhibits and artwork created by community members united around a common idea or theme. By “walking the boxes” around town you can see a panoply of perspectives and unique interpretations of an idea, as well as the many forms creativity can take!
Walk the Boxes!
Visit all five Community Art Box locations:
- Thomas Memorial Library
- Cape Elizabeth Town Hall
- Cape Elizabeth Village Green
- Cape Elizabeth Police Department
- Cape Elizabeth Community Center
What's In the Boxes Now?
We are currently featuring art created during a workshop last year on painting with Posca paint pens led by Cape artist Marie Ahearn. Right now you will find works by Cape residents Leif Maisek, Anne Willett, Sayana Hallal, Sophia Toon, and Kelly Pietrzak. Coming soon: Once in a Blue Moon: Art Based on Idioms
Our Current Art Challenge
Tradition:
Family Recipes
Share a family recipe passed down through generations by presenting it artistically using collage, objects, photos of the person who gave you the recipe–whatever inspires you!
Download the submission form so you can include the story of your recipe that should accompany your work, or stop by the library to pick up a flyer with the form on the back.
The deadline for this challenge
is October 31, 2025!
Submitting Your Artwork
- Your artwork can be in any medium, two or three dimensions, but please keep in mind the following:
- The dimensions of the art box display space are: 24″ high x 21″ wide x 18″ deep. Your artwork must be able to fit inside the space.
- We will put most drawings, paintings, or collages into a glass-fronted frame or shadow-box. Sculptures will be placed directly in the boxes.
- Although we hope the boxes will be weather-proof, moisture can sometimes seep in. We will do our best to make sure your work is protected from the elements.
- We may place several different works of art in one art box.
- Depending on the number of submissions, artwork will be on display for 1 to 4 weeks. We will let you know when your work is on display!
- Please provide a completed submission form to accompany your artwork. If you don’t have a printer, you can fill out a copy of the form in the library.
- Please bring your submissions to the main desk on the upper level of the library.
- Submissions from all ages–adults, teens, and children–are welcome!
The deadline for submissions for this challenge is October 31, 2025
About the Project
The Thomas Memorial Library was one of twelve libraries in the country to receive a grant from the American Library Association, supported by The Estée Lauder Companies WRITING CHANGE initiative. The grant, which supported ALA’s Civic Imagination Station Pilot program, made it possible for librarian and artist teams to develop community-based art projects that encourage civic dialogue.
TML Director Rachel Davis teamed up with local artist Marie Ahearn to apply for the grant. Through a series of workshops and coaching sessions with the entire cohort, Davis and Ahearn developed our Community Art Box project, which consists of mini-galleries located around the Cape Elizabeth town center.
About the Writing Change Initiative and the Civic Imagination Stations Program
WRITING CHANGE is a three-year global, literacy initiative in partnership with Amanda Gorman, the youngest inaugural poet in U.S. history, award-winning writer, and Estée Lauder Global Changemaker. Civic Imagination Station Teams were selected from a national application process conducted in June and July 2022. In August, the teams began participating together in workshops and coaching led by Civic Imagination Stations Lead Artists: Willa J. Taylor, Goodman Theatre’s Walter Director of Education and Engagement; and Michael Rohd, founding Artistic Director of Sojourn Theatre and Co-founder of the Center for Performance and Civic Practice. Through these workshops, Civic Imagination Station cohort teams have been developing their own unique arts-based projects rooted in their respective communities. ALA intends for the Civic Imagination Stations program to model processes by which other librarian/artist partnerships can work together to create locally appropriate and meaningful civic imagination projects.
The selected pilot cohort libraries are:
- Bowdoinham Public Library (Bowdoinham, ME)
- Brandon Free Library (Brandon, VT)
- Burnsville Public Library (Burnsville, WV)
- Chicago Public Library Thurgood Marshall Branch (Chicago, IL)
- Edith B. Siegrist Vermillion Public Library (Vermillion, SD)
- Fayetteville Public Library (Fayetteville, AR)
- IU Libraries: Neal Marshall Black Culture Center Library & Herman B. Wells Library (Bloomington, IN)
- Memphis Public Libraries Cossitt Branch (Memphis, TN)
- Patrick and Beatrice Haggerty Library and Learning Commons, Mount Mary University (Milwaukee, WI)
- The People’s Library (Fox, AR)
- St. Louis Public Library (St. Louis, MO)
- Thomas Memorial Library (Cape Elizabeth, ME)