In this episode of ArtScene | the Podcast, Michael Bell welcomes textile designer and educator Jennifer Rhoades, founder of the Chesapeake Weaving Collective in Rock Hall, Maryland, alongside special guest co-host Lisa J. Gotto.

From a childhood fascination with color to a lifelong career in textile design, Jennifer shares her creative journey, the importance of sustainable fibers, and her passion for preserving the art of weaving. Together, they explore the unexpected paths creativity can take, the impact of arts education, and how one thread can connect generations and communities.

This podcast is part of Bell's Creative Community Access (CCA) Voices initiative, made possible in part through the Kent County Small Business Impact Grant.

Local artists and entrepreneurs. Their art. Their stories. In addition to her current roles as a contributing editor and writer for the Chestertown Spy and various Maryland-centric publications and platforms, Lisa is the principal owner of Tea Leaves Media, LLC, a marketing, communications, and content generation company; tealeavesmedia.com.

What happens when the place that first gives you permission to become an artist becomes the place you return to help others discover the same thing?

On this episode of ArtScene: The Podcast, Michael Bell sits down inside his Cannon Street Art Studio with Kris Kelley, artist and Assistant Director of Chestertown RiverArts, for a deeply personal conversation about art, memory, identity, resilience—and coming home.

Kris first found an artistic community in Chestertown as a teenager, long before she could have imagined returning years later to help lead the organization that grew into RiverArts. With a background in both psychology and art, her creative practice moves across photography, stained glass, mosaic, sculpture and mixed media, often exploring the complicated places where memory and lived experience meet.

Michael and Kris talk about who gets to call themselves an artist, why community matters more than competition, the objects that carry our memories, and what can happen when art gives difficult experiences somewhere to go. Kris also shares the story behind her involvement in Sole Strength, an exhibition centered on the stories of domestic violence survivors, as the episode arrives at the beginning of Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

And the conversation comes full circle when Kris steps beyond the microphone and into Michael’s Creative Community Access (CCA) initiative herself, reflecting on her experience in one of his free Intro to Visual Journaling workshops.

This is a conversation about more than making art. It’s about finding your place, leaving it, seeing it differently—and sometimes choosing to come home.

CCA Voices is part of Michael Bell’s Creative Community Access initiative, expanding ArtScene: The Podcast to amplify the artists, stories and creative lives shaping Chestertown.

I think that final bold sentence before the CCA boilerplate is the sell:

“finding your place, leaving it, seeing it differently—and sometimes choosing to come home.”

That's Kris's episode in one line, and it also ties beautifully into what you've been saying in the podcast about how sometimes home hasn't changed nearly as much as we have. It gives this episode an emotional identity instead of reading like “Episode with the Assistant Director of RiverArts.”

Want a preview? Watch a 60-second clip from Kelley’sconversation, recorded inside Michael Bell’s Cannon Street Art Studio, as she reflects on her experience with CCA Visual Journaling and why it offers an accessible way into art for everyone at: https://www.youtube.com/@mbellart/shorts

Learn more about Bell’s CannonStreet Art Studio, CCA and upcoming experiences at mbellart.com/studio.

Michael Bell’s Cannon Street ArtStudio312 Cannon StreetChestertown, MarylandMBELLART.com

What happens when the art of hospitality meets the art of storytelling?

In this episode of ArtScene | the Podcast, Michael Bell sits down with Hilari and Dave Rinehart, owners of Brampton 1860, a historic 35-acre estate just outside Chestertown, Maryland, to talk about entrepreneurship, memory, hospitality, and the kinds of experiences people carry with them long after they leave.

The conversation also introduces a new partnership between Brampton 1860 and Bell’s Cannon Street Art Studio, where Brampton guests can now book three private artist-led experiences:

Love Letters — an intimate couples experience using writing, visual journaling, and shared artmaking to reconnect with memory, conversation, and one another.

Drawing the Line — a deeply personal visual journaling experience exploring identity, memory, place, and the invisible lines connecting the chapters of a life.

Saints & Sinners — a playful collaborative art experience for small groups combining music, movement, blindfolds, and abstract artmaking inspired by the Seven Deadly Sins.

And in one of the episode’s most unexpected moments, Hilari and Dave agree to try the opening of Love Letters on the spot. Given two completely different prompts and writing privately without knowing what the other has been asked, they both independently return to the same early moment in their relationship.

As Bell reflects during the episode, these experiences aren’t really about learning to draw.

They’re about seeing.

Seeing another person again. Seeing your own story differently. And creating something meaningful enough to stay with you.

Because maybe your next masterpiece doesn’t hang on a wall.

Maybe it’s a conversation.

Learn more about Brampton 1860 and the new experiences at bramptoninn.com and MBELLART.com.