They Truly Brought the Arts Alive

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THEY TRULY BROUGHT THE ARTS ALIVE FOR S.D.

How the Thurmans unified and celebrated our arts culture

Story by Katie Hunhoff

ARTS ALIVE was the first publication in South Dakota to bring together art enthusiasts and organizations throughout the state. Stephen and Catherine Thurman have given voice to that unification since 1981, when they began working with the South Dakota Arts Council (SDAC).

Charlotte Carver, the council’s founder and first executive director, enlisted the Thurmans to write press releases for the new organization. Soon they were delving into newsletters, annual reports and public relations campaigns, beginning their decades-long passion for uniting South Dakotans around the arts.

Stephen and Catherine were married in Sioux Falls in 1980. They soon started a public relations firm, Thurman and Thurman, and specialized in advertising and corporate communications. Stephen is a writer and Catherine is a graphics designer. Both are also talented photographers.

Stephen remembers those early days of Arts Alive. “In the summer of 1998, then SDAC assistant director Jocelyn Hanson came to our office with the idea for a large publication that would actually cover the arts across the state, rather than simply reporting on the Arts Council programs,” he says. “At a Deadwood meeting of the SDAC and then-advocacy organization South Dakotans for the Arts, we presented our design for an oversized publication with standing columns for the advocacy group and SDAC, along with stories on community arts councils, community arts events and trends in the arts across the state. The groups approved and in the fall of 1998, the first issue of Arts Alive was published.”

— Michael Pangburn, former director of the SDAC

Without a doubt, the Arts Alive magazine has had a positive impact in promoting the arts in South Dakota. Stephen’s crisp and interesting writing and Catherine’s eye for color, layout and design have created a publication many South Dakotans look forward to receiving and reading. The arts are clearly alive in South Dakota, and the Thurmans deserve much of the credit for helping to spread that story across the state.

Stephen and Catherine Thurman of Sioux Falls worked together for 23 years to spread arts news across the state.

That was the beginning of the couple’s 23-year career publishing the cutting edge Arts Alive magazine. They wrote, edited, designed and coordinated 69 issues, plus a memorable edition in 2016 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the South Dakota Arts Council.

“One of the critical missions for the founding of Arts Alive was public awareness of all the exciting, creative activities happening in every corner of the state,” Stephen says. “While local arts councils were creating festivals, intercultural exchanges, community theater and so much more, other towns and arts advocates weren’t always in the loop.”

“We needed a large, well-distributed publication to be a clearinghouse for information and a statewide bulletin board for news,” Catherine adds. “Arts Alive filled the bill.”

Their work gave the Thurmans front row seats to the arts in South Dakota, and unique perspectives. “One of the consistent elements of our four decades of working with the arts in South Dakota is the resiliency, determination and importance of the creative spirit,” Stephen says. “Through recession, budget cuts, cultural awakenings and pandemic, the arts find a way.” He also believes the arts have grown in our state through these challenges. “The awareness throughout our state that the arts are a vital element of our shared future is also growing. We see the result in education, in public art and in the power of creative enterprise statewide.”

Catherine and Stephen have favorite memories. For Catherine, it was visiting classrooms to garner story material about the arts in education. “Every time we marvel at the enthusiasm of the students and creativity of teachers in bringing the arts to young people,” she says. “The quality of art coming from South Dakota students is amazing — it’s been so encouraging seeing the next generation of artists at work.”

Stephen’s highlight was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the SDAC. “Assembling the story of the first 50 years of the state arts agency for a special edition was exciting for us, giving so many people the chance to explain why the arts have been a major element in their lives. Hearing those personal experiences confirmed our belief that the arts are stronger than ever,” he recalls.

One challenge that the Thurmans experienced throughout their work with Arts Alive was finding a balance in choosing feature articles. “Our state has so many stories, so many great activities and so much local passion for individual projects that deciding which to run in the publication was difficult,” Stephen says. “We also strove to share the fact that every corner of the state has something happening, not just the larger cities. It’s a big state, geographically, and it’s filled with art.”

But the Thurmans were never alone in making those challenging decisions. They relied on guidance from the South Dakota Arts Council members and the staff of both SDAC and Arts SD. The Thurmans recognized past SDAC executive directors Dennis Holub and Michael Pangburn as vital partners, as well as current SDAC director Patrick Baker and Arts SD executive director Jim Speirs.

As the Thurmans move into retirement from producing Arts Alive, they still plan to be active in the arts, maybe more than in the past. “We like participating in arts events,” Catherine says. “After a lifetime of meeting deadlines and missing great concerts and art shows that we’ve written about because we have an issue to get out, we plan to be a part of more audiences.”

But like all endings, leaving Arts Alive is bittersweet. “We will miss the kindness, cooperation and enthusiasm of the people we talk with all over the state — people who stop what they’re doing to chat about something they love,” Catherine says. “Every issue of Arts Alive has been an opportunity to learn new things and make new friends. Who wouldn’t miss that?”

While Executive Director for South Dakotans for the Arts, I met Stephen and Catherine Thurman through Dennis Holub, then Executive Director of the South Dakota Arts Council, when we were re-envisioning the arts newsletter and created Arts Alive back in the early ’90s. They were then, and continued to be over all these years, an incredible asset to the artists and arts organizations in South Dakota. Their creativity of story ideas, their artistic sense of layout and use of color were exactly what we needed. They never failed us or the South Dakota Arts Council and now Arts South Dakota in our partnership of this dynamic publication. Thank you Stephen and Catherine and best wishes. We are forever grateful.

— Janet Brown, Principal, Janet Brown and Associates, LLC