Our Town Everywhere

Throughout 2023, an ever-growing team of artists and library staff champions Our Town Everywhere: A Self-Portrait of Madison throughout the city of Madison. Following an exciting exhibition at Central Library, this unique portrait-making project will act as a catalyst for joyful connection, deeper conversation, and collaborative creation.

Popping up in libraries, parks, shelters, and other community spaces—who knows!—folks of all ages will be invited to create and contribute their own stamped self portrait into the collection in exchange for another community member’s portrait.

If you have an idea for a way to engage Our Town Everywhere with your group, event, or project, fill out this request form!

Some of our residencies are connected to this program, and you can find related events on the Madison Public Library’s calendar.

Check out our growing album of portraits from around the city!

What is Our Town?

It began in Nashville, Tennessee! Our Town Nashville was a community art project that ran between 2014 and 2015. For two years, letterpress printmaker Bryce McCloud traveled around Davidson County with a team of artists, inviting people from all walks of life to participate in a public art project titled Our Town Nashville. Actively engaging folks in a conversation about community, Our Town Nashville created a space where people unlikely to otherwise participate in art-making could use handmade stamps to create their own self portrait.

With funding and support from the Public Art Fund managed by the Metro Nashville Arts Commission, the Our Town Nashville project appeared in 50 locations across town including shelters, concert halls, police stations, community events, coffee shops and everywhere in between—inviting Nashvillians to step out of their comfort zone and join in a community-wide art experience.

Collecting more than 1,000 portraits, Our Town provided a platform for the city of Nashville to create a more inclusive picture of itself. Our Town gave people a chance to share a human experience that linked them together beyond the confines of class, race, gender, age, culture of origin, or neighborhood.

A collection of Our Town portraits was added to the permanent archives of the Nashville Public Library and digitally on the Our Town website.

Our Town Everywhere continues the great work started in Nashville, inviting the Madison community to participate. At the library, explore the tools of Our Town Everywhere with custom shape stamps, black ink pads, mirrors and a piece of grid paper. Create something that captures the essence of YOU—this can be a traditional stamped self-portrait, an image that captures what’s on the inside, a portrait of who you strive to be . . .