Arts in the Community

The History

Originally founded in 1950 as the Orinda Children's Art Center to supplement art instruction in the Orinda schools, the Orinda Arts Council also has a long legacy of supporting the arts in the broader community over it's 60 year history.

The OAC began installing art exhibits in the 1960's at the Orinda Library and a long tradition of holding elaborate annual Art Events at showcase homes and the Orinda Country Club featuring local professional and student artists to raise funds for arts in the schools and the community. In the early 1970's, the OAC provided critical financial and organizational support for the opening of the new Orinda Community Center in 1973, where it went on to provide visual and performing arts classes for several decades. The 1980's included funding for for the Orinda Community Center Amphitheater and Cal Shakes as it moved to Orinda. And in 1989, The Heart of Orinda, a proposal advocated by the OAC for a physical center of the arts, resulted in the addition of the Orinda Art Library Gallery and Auditorium at the Orinda Community Center in the 1990s.

Since the millennium, the OAC has given $25,000 towards the new Orinda Library and participated on the Art in Public Places Committee. We've also partnered with the Pacific Chamber Symphony, the Orinda Film Festival and sponsored the California Independent Film Festival Iron Filmmakers Contest