Altamont Library Notes for Tuesday, September 27, 2022
The Enterprise — Melissa Hale-Spencer
“Branching Out”: Teenage artists have depicted what libraries mean to them. The traveling mural is on display outside of the Altamont Free Library through Oct. 8.
You may have noticed something new outside the library. It’s pretty hard to miss!
This past weekend at the Altamont Fall Fun Day, we unveiled a temporary traveling mural created in the summer of 2021 by a group of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) teen artists from Albany, Troy, and Schenectady.
The mural is called “Branching Out” and its creation was a collaborative program of Albany Public Library, Amplified Voices, Albany Center Gallery, and the Albany Barn. The teen artists worked with mentors and educators from Amplified Voices, whose mission is to elevate the work of BIPOC artists and to address racism in our society.
The artists were asked to consider what libraries meant to them, and their response was the incredible mural that you can see outside of the library though Oct. 8. Their mural challenges the viewer to “create your own world.” Having been on view at several libraries around the Capital District, we are very proud to be able to share it with the Altamont community. Please come take a look!
Campion Exhibit
Speaking of temporary art exhibits, for the next month and a half or so, we’ll be hosting a really cool display in our foyer display case. Diane Campion is a local artist who works in many media, and we’ll be showing a collection of paintings and drawings that she has done in her extensive travels around the world. Her travels journals are an inspirational and vibrant expression of the magic of seeing new places. Come check it out! Thank you, Diane, for letting us display a small bit of your incredible work!
First Monday
Book Club
Do you love to read? Do you love taking about what you’ve read with other interesting and smart people? If so, please join us for the next meeting of the First Monday Book Club on Monday, Oct. 3, at noon. If you would like to join us for our next meeting, please call us at 518-861-7239 or email us at and we’ll make sure that you get all the details.
At that meeting, we’ll be discussing “Manhattan Beach” by Jennifer Egan. There will be plenty to discuss, so call today to reserve your copy and join us!
Ukulele Group
Do you uke? If you do, even if you’re not very good yet, please join our monthly outdoor ukulele meetup. Our next meeting will be Tuesday, Oct. 4, at 6 p.m. in Orsini Park, and we’d love for you to join us. Bring a song or two to share with the group if you like. This is a fun, inviting way of growing as a player, picking up hits and tips, learning new tunes, and meeting fellow ukesters. We hope to see you in the park!
All of the lights!
Two weeks ago, we finally completed a project that we’ve been working towards for a very long time: We’ve replaced all of the fluorescent lights in the library with energy efficient LEDs! This change is calculated to save the library nearly 7,000 kilowatt hours of energy per year, and will save the library more than $750 per year in utility costs per year, which for us is a lot!
Even better, we won’t have to get the tallest guy we know to get up on the tallest ladder in the Village anymore to replace the lightbulbs in our ceiling anymore, since these new lights are likely to last us for years and years! We are very grateful to the town of Guilderland for their assistance in helping us secure the grant that paid for this project, which will make our library more environmentally and financially sustainable for years to come!