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Undeniably, there have been gains from regional research: incentives, fundraising, investments and understanding. But a foundational problem persists, community arts organizations and individual artists - particularly marginalized and Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC), LGBTQIA+ artists, elder-senior artists, artists with disabilities- are eking- out a living in patch-work entrepreneurial endeavors, cobble together in irregular and vulnerable gig-work, from work spaces that are regularly unstable, unsafe or unaffordable.
Unparalleled in any other industry, Artists continue to be regularly offered “exposure” instead of fair pay. This is a failure of shared value, where the true economic role of the arts is generally not accurately perceived nor accounted for in economic planning or community development.
As in the well-documented “Soho Effect”, artists’ improvements to neighborhood vitalization is then “Discovered” by developers, who have capital to invest in ownership that leads to gentrification, which makes unaffordable the unique spaces that artists and local cultural entrepreneurs made attractive to investors.
Artists and local cultural entrepreneurs act as core-investors, attracted to affordable space and potential. Rarely do they have capital to own property, so they can’t get loans for improvements, nor secure their investment, once the landlord wants to cash in on the increased property values.
Research shows the quantitative economic and cultural value of artists and cultural entrepreneurs (evidenced in the bibliography and attachments herein). Studies’ results have long called for affordable, safe, accessible, inclusive, neighborhood live/work space. We’ve collectively identified and re-identified the need for more arts education in schools, neighborhood arts funding, non-profit-owned spaces, professional development resources and renewable funding sources that reflect our proportionate contribution to our regional economy, joy and health. The brunt of the story and reality fall hardest on the most vulnerable and least resourced and in large part, the needs haven’t dramatically changed. In fact, for BIPOC and other marginalized Creatives, as in those
communities in general, the disparity of privilege is escalating.
Economic times for the arts are particularly hard for marginalized neighborhoods that
continuously receive fewer compensating resources for economic and cultural self-
determination. Over and over, administrators’ and politicians’ invest in consultants, feasibility
studies, research and plans that are quickly forgotten when big funders have a pet idea,
elections press or corporations change priorities. Art organizations that are not artist-founded,
nor artist-run, tend toward top-down perspectives that are highly influenced by property
owners, corporations, big funders and politicians. Artists, particularly BIPOC, only experience things from the ground where they work, from the bottom-up of daily-life’s demands, and from the grass roots, community-level of their peers and neighborhoods.
In 2020, when this Tool Kit is being written, Covid-19 pandemic, Black Lives Matter protests world-wide, national elections and global threats of recession dominate. This combination is exposing the undeniability of privilege
and inequitable prosperity, foundational racism, dominating corporate consolidation, entrenched cronyism and accelerating climate crisis. Recessions, pandemics and social unrest pull away resources for vulnerable artists, at the same time their work, teaching, voices, music, words, visions, films, photographs and acts remain in constant demand and intricately part of everyday life for everyone.
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