It’s hard to carve out time for creativity in today’s frenetic world. Studio PAUSE founder Sushmita Mazumdar has established a space where people can do just that—step away from their digital devices to discover the joys of analog storytelling and making things by hand.
After creating her first storybook in 2007—a tale of her Indian childhood to be shared with her American children—Mazumdar began leading book arts workshops throughout the DMV, including at the Smithsonian, helping immigrant families tell their stories through mixed media.
Art is a universal language, she says, but the workshops revealed barriers beyond the spoken word: “I also needed to teach people to pause, to make that time to explore creativity and to celebrate the community we live in.”
Through cooperative agreements, grants and partners, Mazumdar opened Studio PAUSE in 2013 and found a permanent home for her creative space in Arlington’s Rinker Community Center in 2015. A second studio location opened along the Columbia Pike corridor in 2023. Both spaces serve residents of affordable housing complexes, inviting them to enjoy the art exhibits or join poetry and bookmaking workshops free of charge. (Workshops are also available to the wider community for $10 or pay-what-you-will prices.)
During Family Art PAUSE events on select Friday evenings, artists lead children’s workshops while parents relax and chat over tea. Another community project—called “Mapping Home”—invites participants to embellish property maps of their apartment complexes with personal memories and symbols. The resulting works are dotted with herb gardens, basketball courts, school bus stops, friendly neighbors and even friendlier dogs.
Tucked between Goodwill and Café Sazón, the Columbia Pike studio doubles as a gallery displaying visual and literary artworks in a variety of media (textiles, collage, photography, embroidery, poetry), many of which are for sale. Original works are priced between $200 and $650, while prints start at $50.
The sky-blue walls of the Paula Endo and Lloyd Wolf Gallery—named after the founders of the Columbia Pike Documentary Project—showcase portraits and stories of local residents in a rich display of the Pike’s cultural diversity. There are impromptu exhibits, too, from windows adorned for the holidays to colorful drawings by children.
In a world often defined by divisions and diversions, Mazumdar is optimistic about what this inclusive art studio can do. “We can change our whole community,” she says, “when we become more understanding of each other.”