INNOVATORS Gold Award - New Orleans City Business

INNOVATOR
PHOTO BY SHANNON DIECIDUE
The Art Station owner and director Kim Zabbia reviews a piece of art with students, from left, Mary Lavigne, Diana Pilcher and Judy Nesser.
The Art Station
Key innovation: providing art classes for adults
Biggest client: local and regional professionals seeking
to explore the arts
Where they’re based: Ponchatoula
Top executive: Kim Zabbia, owner and director
Year introduced: 2007
2007 sales: about $5,000 to $8,000 monthly
JUST SLIGHTLY MORE than a year since its official opening,
The Art Station in downtown Ponchatoula has become
a sanctuary for high-pressured, overworked professionals
looking for a way to express themselves creatively.
“We have nurses, CPAs, lawyers, judges and doctors
who come here on a regular basis,” said Kim Zabbia of
The Art Station’s more than 650 registrants, “not to
mention housewives who have spent their entire day with
their children and just need a break.”
Zabbia, owner and director of The Art Station, taught art
at Ponchatoula High School for about three decades before
retiring with the idea that local adults might be well-served
by a facility that not only offers an array of art classes but also
provides an opportunity to meet similarly inclined adults in
an artistic environment.
“It is very much a place to go to learn about the arts and be
a part of them,” said Lucille Griffin, who has taken about 16
classes in a variety of disciplines at The Art Station.“But it really
also provides a kind of emotional outlet where you can meet
and talk with other people who share your interests. I look at it
as a very welcome place that takes me out of my daily routine.”
Offering classes from traditional watercolors to
Impressionist painting, knitting, interior decorating and
digital photography, The Art Station’s clientele is not
typically students interested in pursuing art as a career.
“The kind of people who are most likely to come here are
those who want to just learn about drawing or working with
clay, and have a good time,” Zabbia said. “Although we have
had professionals come in who want to experiment in another
medium: photographers who want to try clay, graphic
designers who want to paint.”
With classes varying in size “from 20 to as few as two,”
Zabbia said, The Art Station has attracted students ranging
in age from 18 to 85.
“I have seen the loyalty part in the number of people who
wanted to donate money to us but could not count it on their
taxes because we are a business,” Zabbia said. “So in
response we formed the Friends of The Art Station, which
is designed to raise money for adult scholarships for those
who want to come here but may not be able to afford it.”•
— Garry Boulard
12A 2008 Innovator of the Year