The Mastheads is a public arts and humanities project in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. We seek to connect residents to the literary history of the region, create a forum for thinking about place, and support the production of new creative work. Founded in 2016, The Mastheads is at once an urban architectural experiment, a literary research initiative, a writers’ residency, and an educational program.
Our Projects
Architectural Studios: The physical spaces of The Mastheads are five writing studios on wheels, each the architectural interpretation of the original structure from which one of five American Renaissance authors wrote while in Pittsfield: Herman Melville, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., and Henry David Thoreau. The studios have been installed in different locations around the Berkshires for diverse Mastheads public programming and events, including Mass MoCA, Hancock Shaker Village, Springside Park, and Canoe Meadows. They are now permanently installed in the fields at Melville’s Arrowhead.
Writers’ Residencies: Every July, we host a several-week residency that brings five emerging writers from across the country to live and work in Pittsfield. Residents receive exclusive use of one of the Mastheads studios, travel reimbursement, meals or a meal stipend, and a private room in a house or dormitory shared with the other residents. Beyond July, The Mastheads studios are open seasonally for day-residencies on the grounds of Herman Melville’s Arrowhead.
Poetry in Schools: During the school year, The Mastheads operates its poetry-in-schools program, Fireside, in Pittsfield Public Schools. Students compose original poetry, and each semester-length course culminates in a student poetry anthology and a public showcase. We collaborate with other Berkshire cultural organizations to create high-quality public events that celebrate student work, such as our annual Party in Kellogg Park, a poetry reading and family luncheon in the ballroom at Hotel on North, and text installations throughout the city.
Publications and Design: We publish work by historic Pittsfield writers, our Fireside students, our July residents, and current Berkshire writers through engaging design that is easily accessible by local residents. We have produced newspaper folds for The Berkshire Eagle; a series of Mastheads Readers, carefully curated and collections of writing by Pittsfield authors; and anthologies of student poetry. We’ve installed text on billboards, sidewalks, park fences, hats, gloves, tree tags, and inside essential businesses during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. We collaborate with local artists to decorate the city with the words of Pittsfield authors.
Public Humanities Programming: We produce city-wide humanities programming with a new theme each year. Our events include public lectures, park festivals, community conversations, and literary readings. Featured historical writers have included Herman Melville, Edith Wharton, W.E.B DuBois, James Van Der Zee, Catherine Maria Sedgwick, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry David Thoreau, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, William Cullen Bryant, Mark Twain, Henry James, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., and Fanny Kemble.
Our Team
Tessa Kelly, Co-Founder & Design Director
Sarah Trudgeon, Literary Director
Christian Schlegel, Residency Support
Ashu Rai, Don’Jea Smith, Gillian Ebersole, Nora Claire Miller, Poetry Instructors
Jeff Lawrence, Research Advisor
Alicia Mireles Christoff, Social Justice Initiatives
Chris Parkinson, Co-Founder
Our Impact
Since 2017, we have provided poetry workshops to over 1,200 Pittsfield public school students, helping them build a positive relationship with school and writing.
We have brought 30 published authors from around the country to Pittsfield to write and get to know our city; installed student & resident writing in 21 different sites throughout the county (in addition to over 1,000 winter hats); published dozens of anthologies of student poetry; created 11 newspaper folds and 3 books of Berkshire writing; and hosted more than 50 public events.
We have created job opportunities for local creators and inspired them to develop their own projects and initiatives. We have hosted 46 local writers and artists for Day Residencies in our studios. Every day, we work with residents of all ages to create a Pittsfield we can be proud of.
About the Name "The Mastheads"
Aboard the Pequod, the whaling ship in Moby Dick in which Ishmael sails, crew members take shifts climbing up high into the masthead, looking out for whales. From that new vantage point, they see the world around them from a different perspective, elevated far off the ship’s deck. At the same time, Ishmael describes the masthead—a space large enough for only one person—as an opportunity to look inward, and encounter new aspects of oneself.
. . .lulled into such an opium-like listlessness of vacant, unconscious reverie is this absent-minded youth by the blending cadence of waves with thoughts, that at last he loses his identity; takes the mystic ocean at his feet for the visible image of that deep, blue, bottomless soul, pervading mankind and nature; and every strange, half-seen, gliding, beautiful thing that eludes him; every dimly-discovered, uprising fin of some undiscernible form, seems to him the embodiment of those elusive thoughts that only people the soul by continually flitting through it. In this enchanted mood, thy spirit ebbs away to whence it came; becomes diffused through time and space. . .
info@themastheads.org
photos by Iwan Baan