The Changing Arts

Estero Cultural Scene Going Up, Up, Up with Two Performance Halls and More

By Charles Runnells
Ft. Myers News-Press
May 23, 2007

Exactly when it happened, no one seems to know for sure. But happen it did.

Sometime in the last three years, things started changing in the Estero arts scene. In a big way.

Suddenly, there’s Arts Estero, a group that promotes the arts. There’s Estero Community Park, where the Southwest Florida Symphony performed free for the first time this January. And there’s the brand-new Coconut Point mall, where artists can show their work in the office galleries.

Now, two huge arts projects are brewing. And things likely will change even more.

“I don’t really know why it happened,” says Jim Wallace, developer of the Art District at Rapallo. “All of the sudden, there’s a need.”

Rapallo will boast art galleries and a small hall that shows art movies and attracts traveling musical and theatrical acts.

And Gulfshore Playhouse — part of the Estero on the River development project — will house Estero’s first full-time, professional troupe. That project still needs to get commission approval.

It’s been a whirlwind of artsy activity. And Estero artist Caroll Cornelius, for one, says it’s been a long time coming.

“It’s very exciting,” Cornelius says. “The level of the arts keeps going up and up and up.”

If things keep going this way, Estero could rival Naples as an arts mecca in Southwest Florida, some arts supporters say.

No one thing seems to have set off this renaissance, says Cas Obie, former president of Arts Estero. It was just several projects happening at once, independently.

“It’s just serendipity,” says Obie, who is still a member of Arts Estero but stepped down in March to care for his mother. “It’s just wonderful.

“Everybody was working on their own projects, and then they looked at each other and said, ‘Wow.’ ”

The developers of Estero on the River and Gulfshore Playhouse, however, believe they had something to do with this blossoming arts scene. When both those projects got started three years ago, nobody else was thinking that way, says artistic director Kristen Coury.

“Nobody was talking about the arts in Estero before we were,” Coury says.

“Everybody thought Estero was just a place you passed through on the way from Fort Myers to Naples.”

But art inspires more art, says Andy D’Jamoos, vice president of sales and marketing for developer J.E.D. of Southwest Florida Inc. And once Estero on the River got the ball rolling, everybody else seemed to roll along
with it.

“I think that’s what got it all started,” D’Jamoos says. “It was Kristin and us bringing the idea out.”

Cheryl Mease, 57, of Bonita Springs often visits Estero, and she likes what’s happening there. Still, she doubts it was any one project that sparked this arts explosion.

“It’s a natural progression of growth here,” she says. “It’s inevitable.

“It’s time.”

The Estero on the River project is tentatively set to go before the county commission June 4 for final approval. Then the project itself could take several years.

The residential and commercial project will boast art galleries and Gulfshore Playhouse. And to make sure the playhouse happened, D’Jamoos donated the land it will be built on.

“It’s our way of contributing to the culture of Estero,” he says. “It was our way of making it happen.”

Like Florida Repertory Theatre in Fort Myers, Gulfshore Playhouse will be inhabited by a full-time, professional troupe.

But Coury is quick to point out that the troupe is already active, and they’ve produced two shows in the last year. And more are on the way.

“Gulfshore Playhouse is a living, breathing entity already,” she says. “We exist.”

The Art District at Rapallo project, by comparison, is much farther along. There are already 540 homes at Rapallo. The Art District will add another 256, plus 36 “live-work studios” where artists can live, work and display their art. It could attract everyone from painters and sculptors to fashion designers, architects and photographers, Wallace says.

The place will be a pedestrian-friendly community mixing homes, art studios, shops, cafes, public art and performance venues. The project’s biggest highlight will probably be its 18,600-square-foot performing arts hall.

Wallace patterned the 506-seat facility after other small Florida halls such as the Riverside Theatre in Vero Beach and the Lyric Theatre in Stuart.

The hall will bring in acts that might otherwise skip Southwest Florida, either because they can’t fill a bigger space like Mann Hall in Fort Myers or because they like smaller, more intimate settings, Wallace says.

It will attract a mix of performers and shows, from Gordon Lightfoot, Crystal Gayle and Arlo Guthrie to the Vienna Choir Boys and “Goodnight, Gracie.”

The stage will also be open to local theater groups for three or four performances each year, Wallace says.

On top of that, the hall will have a movie screen for showing independent, foreign and art movies in a digital format. The shows could include everything from a Shakespeare film series to the Best of Cannes and Sundance.

“We’d kind of like to be people’s favorite art-house theater,” Wallace says.

The Art District could break ground by October, and start opening in late 2008.

With all these changes happening — and even more on the horizon — it’s a wonderful time to live in Southwest Florida, says retired art teacher Pat Abosch, 65, of Estero.

“I think it’s great,” Abosch says. “All this development has been really wonderful. “Now you don’t have to go that far to see performances.”

And there’s no telling where Estero will end up, says Obie of Arts Estero.

“There’s absolutely no question about how exciting it is,” he says.