MISSION

To connect communities through socially engaging arts practices rooted in papermaking and printmaking.

VISION

An inclusive future where everyone can engage in a brave space of commonality, connection and empathy through the arts.

CORE VALUES

Educate every level of experience in the arts. “I too can be an artist”
Connect people through mobile, in-house and virtual programming
Foster a positive culture through storytelling and the traditions of craft/making
Access, participation, and representation for underrepresented communities, inclusive of individuals that identify as BIPOC, Disabled, and LGBTQIA+.
Centering the environment and stewarding the land to create sustainability, including the honoring of its original inhabitants and the use of non-toxic and recyclable materials.
Honor our legacy of providing support for veterans in the arts

Silkscreens with the caption "We connect communities through socially engaging arts practices rooted in papermaking and printmaking.

HISTORY

Frontline Arts, formerly known as the Printmaking Center of New Jersey (PCNJ), was incorporated on December 10, 1974. Originally founded as the Printmaking Council of New Jersey, Founders Lois Berghoff, Zelda Burdick, Florence Wender, Carol Yudin and Peter Chapin, envisioned an organization that would help local artists as well as promote the fine art of printmaking statewide.

In 1978, the mobile program Roving Press attracted the attention of the Somerset County Parks Commission, which had recently acquired 35 acres of property donated by Ralph T. Reeve to be used as a statewide cultural complex bearing his name. The organization was offered three acres and a two-story framed building, which once housed the offices of a lumber company, through an ongoing lease with the Somerset County Parks Commission. The Ralph T. Reeve Cultural Center located in Branchburg, New Jersey has been home to our offices, gallery, mobile programming, and fully-equipped printmaking and papermaking studios ever since.

In 2018, the Printmaking Center of New Jersey merged with its fiscal project known as Frontline Arts, originally founded under PCNJ in 2011 as Combat Paper NJ. This unique community-oriented Veterans’ papermaking program taught Veterans of all service eras and branches the transformational practice of making handmade paper from military uniforms. Through a process of Deconstruction, Reclamation, and Communication, Veterans connect with each other and different communities, sharing their personal stories with the world through handmade paper, printmaking, and participatory artmaking.

Out of this nationally-recognized and growing Veterans’ papermaking program, now called Frontline Paper, Frontline Arts, was born in 2015, developing a social awareness through community art. In September 2017, the acquisition agreement was signed by both organizations. On March 31, 2018, the acquisition was finalized with the legal name change to Frontline Arts A New Jersey Non-Profit Corporation. Since 2018, Frontline Arts has grown by adapting the Frontline Paper model as a new connective practice to be applied across different communities including immigrant communities in the South Bronx and Corona Queens, healthcare professionals and communities affected by the pandemic, and more. This focus on broadening our engagement opened up new opportunities to revitalize our membership, offer new studio services whether classes, contract printing, or exhibitions.

While the name has been Frontline Arts since 2018, the spirit of social engagement has been our movement since 2011, and the ethos of community building through craft has lived through us since 1974. We live and breathe facilitating, making, observing, and participating in community arts by delivering a cohesive connective practice, which outlines the use of craft to discover commonalities and accept differences between communities, to help foster social bonds and promote positive change.