Tasty treat also helps arts groups Stonington Opera House sees big sales for Art Bars

Oh, the versatility of chocolate! It goes with peanut butter, cherries, red wine and it’s pretty good all on its own. But just when you think you’ve seen – make that tasted – all its wonder, the Stonington Opera House has come up with a new combo: chocolate and art.

Late last year, the year-round arts center and movie house started stocking Art Bars at its concession stand. Each of the Swiss-made, organic – and lusciously creamy – chocolate bars comes with a miniature printed reproduction of a piece by a contemporary American adult or international child artist. In addition to being Fair Trade Certified, the bars have a public mission. Ithaca Fine Chocolates, which imports and distributes the bars, donates a minimum of 10 percent of the profits to national organizations for arts education.

“We were completely charmed by the art bar idea,” said Judith Jerome, artistic director and concession stocker at the Opera House. “We sell Skittles, too, but we do care about people eating good movie food, and this turned out to be really good chocolate.”

The 1.6-ounce bars sell for $3 each. That’s a dollar more than a Hershey’s and a dollar less than organic Endangered Species bars, both of which the Opera House sells, in addition to organic popcorn prepared in a vintage Manley popper. Art Bars come in milk chocolate with hazelnuts as well as plain dark chocolate varieties, and are among the Opera House’s most popular offerings, selling almost as much as plain M&Ms, according to Linda Nelson, executive director of Opera House Arts, the venue’s producing organization.

Nelson came across the chocolate bars about a year ago at a natural foods store in Oregon.

“I don’t even like chocolate, but my eye was casting over the possibilities,” said Nelson, a graduate of Bowdoin College. “I am always interested in things that have a bigger social purpose than just being commercial. If I had my way, everything we sold would have a social mission. As a nonprofit, we’re not in the business of creating individual personal wealth but of building social capital. That’s part of our mission. I’ve watched funding for arts education go down in the last 20 years. Anything we can do for integrated arts education is great – for all ages, not just kids.”

Erika Fowler-Decatur, founder of Ithaca Fine Chocolates, shares that point of view. An art historian and arts administrator, Fowler-Decatur established her company three years ago to offer a delicious way of promoting artists and arts education. At first, she featured local artists. Now she has a national lineup of adult and children artists whose “collectible art cards” are included with the chocolate. Although no Maine artists are featured, Fowler-Decatur hopes Maine artists will visit the company’s Web site and go through the application process.

As with the Stonington Opera House leaders, Fowler-Decatur believes in the power of arts education to open and prepare young minds to participate imaginatively in local and global conversations.

“Creativity needs to be fostered,” the arts-savvy chocolatier said. “We need kids with the ability to think creatively, outside the box. They need to be taught to think in unique ways, to wander and peruse an idea. If that happens, we’ll be raising children to do better than we’ve done.”

Art Bars are sold in 300 venues nationally, including co-operative markets, museums, galleries, bookstores, movie theaters and art supply stores. The Stonington Opera House is the only place the chocolates are available in Maine.

For information about Arts Bars, visit www.ithacafinechocolates.com. To learn more about the Stonington Opera House, visit www.operahousearts.org. Alicia Anstead can be reached at aanstead@bangordailynews.net.