By Victoria Mullen, WKTV

With the second weekend of ArtPrize in full swing and people casting last-minute votes for their favorite works of art, Wyoming-Kentwood Community Media’s VOICES: a community history project powered by WKTV rolled out the red carpet and welcomed scores of visitors to tour our renovated 1958 Airstream® mobile studio and learn more about the oral history project.

VOICES collects, preserves, and shares the stories of West Michigan people from all backgrounds and beliefs, with a focus on Wyoming, Kentwood and the greater Grand Rapids area. 

VOICES is a free public service, offering a comfortable video recording studio with a relaxed atmosphere. High-tech video and audio equipment records the stories of our neighbors, friends and family — any story from anyone — that make up the fabric of our lives and our community. Participants tell their stories of hardships and successes, of what shaped them and their families into the kind of people they are today. Our lives, experiences, joys, sorrows, triumphs and tragedies are what make us all human.

Interviews usually take place between two people who know and care about each other. They can be friends, family or mere acquaintances. At the end of each 40-minute recording session, participants receive a complimentary DVD of their interview. Each recording is also archived with the Library of Congress.

Interviews can be “life reviews,” conducted with people at the end of their careers. Or they can focus on a specific period or a specific event in people’s lives, as with war veterans or survivors of an earthquake, flood or hurricane.

VOICES is available year-round. Our mobile studio will be at ArtPrize Nine again, Friday and Saturday, Oct. 6-7 from 10am-8pm*. Thereafter, it will travel to other locations.

To reserve a time to tell your story, go here.

Upcoming dates at other locations:

Monday-Friday, Oct. 16-20 — Wyoming Public Library (3350 Michael Ave SW, Wyoming, MI) from 10am-8pm*, and Monday-Thursday, Oct. 23-Oct. 26, from 10am-8pm*.

Monday-Thursday, Nov. 6-9 and Monday-Thursday, Nov. 13-16 — Kentwood Public Library (4950 Breton Rd SE, Kentwood, MI), from 10am-8pm*.

*Last appointment of the day is 7pm.