By Steve Martarano | Solving Sacramento
Sacramento’s vibrant arts and cultural offerings would be much worse off if not for the city’s varied and diverse neighborhood fixtures.
That commitment is found through examples such as the historical Florin Square and the Sojourner Truth African Heritage Museum, through the wide array of programming provided by the Latino Center of Arts and Culture near Broadway and Front Street, at Curtis Park’s Side Door music venue, or the eclectic businesses and art galleries along Del Paso Boulevard and R Street.
Daniel Castaneda’s VIP Café, with its eye-catching garden mural of a saxophonist visible from Del Paso Boulevard, is a recent example of a business helping to revitalize its neighborhood by creating a community hub, offering barbecue meats and sandwiches with a Latin flair while hosting community and nonprofit events.
“I think it’s very important for businesses to be open on the Boulevard,” Castaneda says, noting that VIP Café opened in early 2024. “Because you’re not going to have to go as far, and it’s there for the people, for the neighborhood.”
The importance of art and cultural offerings in neighborhoods, says Luisa Lavulo, chair of the Sacramento Arts, Culture and Creative Economy Commission, is how they can get community members to participate and take ownership for what they create. The City of Sacramento’s Office of Arts and Culture is dedicated to supporting, promoting and advancing the arts throughout Sacramento.
Lavulo says the city is attempting to connect better with the arts and culture community to let members know what resources are available. “The city does want to invest back into the community,” she says. “It’s just up to the commission to make sure that we’re letting our constituents, in each of our districts, know that there are resources out there. There are grants out there for local artists, and we’d love for the local artists to take advantage of those.”
Johnny Walker, creative director at CASA de ESPAÑOL on R Street, says collaboration with others along the R Street Corridor is the key to a strong neighborhood presence.
“We work well with WAL [Warehouse Artists Lofts] and the other galleries here,” Walker says. “We are good friends with Twisted Track [Gallery]. We try and collaborate with them, and we try to draw people down here to see what we have going on.”
While there are dozens of arts and cultural touchstones enriching the lives of Sacramento residents, here are a few examples where neighborhood community members are stepping up, and residents are benefitting.
This story is part of the Solving Sacramento journalism collaborative. This story was funded by the City of Sacramento’s Arts and Creative Economy Journalism Grant to Solving Sacramento. Following our journalism code of ethics, the city had no editorial influence over this story. Our partners include California Groundbreakers, Capital Public Radio, Outword, Russian America Media, Sacramento Business Journal, Sacramento News & Review, Sacramento Observer and Univision 19. Sign up for our “Sac Art Pulse” newsletter here.