This past weekend, the newly formed group West Point Fine Arts crowd-funded enough money to hold a pop-up gallery in downtown West Point. It drew quite the crowd and not only gave local artists — both new and emerging — recognition for their work, but commission for it as well.

With such support for a celebration of art, it is apparent that West Point and the rest of Chambers County, in the words of the founder of WPFA Thea McElvey, “are hungry for it.”

As a new member of the community, that is exciting to hear. The towns that make up Chambers County are bursting with personality and pride, and putting a greater emphasis on the arts will capture these attributes in creative mediums that can be passed down to later generations.

Local art brings out the culture of the community it is created in, so it will be interesting to see what that looks, sounds and feels like in Chambers County.

All of this is only a possibility, however, if local artist have the means to create.

This means that if you’re one of those who are “hungry” for it, you have an influence on how much can be made. It means going to galleries and talking about them with friends. It means getting involved in local art scenes, even if that is just a comment on a WPFA post. It means spending your hard-earned dollars on work by local artists, giving them the means to create more.

Continuing the blossoming trend of local, Chambers County art is dependent on the community that the art itself is focused on.

Supporting local art and artists is supporting the preservation of this community’s culture, allowing those that come after us to get a glimpse of what life was like before them.