Comments on: Lost South http://www.artandwork.us/2009/11/lost-south/ A National Conversation About Art, Labor, And Economics Fri, 21 Oct 2011 12:05:53 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Adam Trowbridge http://www.artandwork.us/2009/11/lost-south/comment-page-1/#comment-874 Adam Trowbridge Thu, 15 Apr 2010 21:31:19 +0000 http://www.artandwork.us/?p=146#comment-874 Update: The Ruse of the Creative Class Cities that shelled out big bucks to learn Richard Florida's prescription for vibrant urbanism are now hearing they may be beyond help. http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_ruse_of_the_creative_class Update:

The Ruse of the Creative Class

Cities that shelled out big bucks to learn Richard Florida’s prescription for vibrant urbanism are now hearing they may be beyond help.

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_ruse_of_the_creative_class

]]> By: Denise http://www.artandwork.us/2009/11/lost-south/comment-page-1/#comment-608 Denise Sat, 20 Feb 2010 15:51:11 +0000 http://www.artandwork.us/?p=146#comment-608 Everytime I'm in Chattanooga I drive down Main Street to see if Estate of Confusion is open so I can prowl for cool junk. The 1st attempt a few years ago at an art district there seemed OK, though not very inhabited. This month, I must admit, I was turned off. There was a corporate feel about the renovations. It felt uncomfortably expensive. The public art lining the street wasn't so much incorporated as "evenly placed". Coming from Knoxville, where we haven't had the tax and city incentives to create a district, what we have ended up with has been very artist originated/controlled DIY. It feels sincere because it is. We do have the Gay Street 100 block arts "anchor", but all the random other locations have all been created by local, not "artificially imported" artists. Other locations are in pre-existing businesses. The University's art dept. and grad students run wild with these places-visiting artists from the sister school in Poland always have a place to show. There are no martinis, but seeing a cool exhibit from an emergent artist in a hairdressing salon with PBR's on ice in the hairwashing sinks, or other progressive art in small galleries in odd studio and warehouse spaces scattered thoughout downtown is sustainable, and will continue to be because we don't have any government support. We collectively made a pact a few years back: Tax incentives and grants are artificial, and if you depend on them, you will be doomed if they are suddenly withdrawn. Just DIY in the dirt and on a shoestring and you will survive. I do love Chattanooga-the Hunter is a wonderful museum and Ruth Grover is doing a kick-ass job at UTC bringing in amazing exhibits, but the chrome and steel renovation of Main Street is like putting Valentino on an old ho-it don't look right and it ain't gonna feed the hooker. Everytime I’m in Chattanooga I drive down Main Street to see if Estate of Confusion is open so I can prowl for cool junk. The 1st attempt a few years ago at an art district there seemed OK, though not very inhabited. This month, I must admit, I was turned off. There was a corporate feel about the renovations. It felt uncomfortably expensive. The public art lining the street wasn’t so much incorporated as “evenly placed”.
Coming from Knoxville, where we haven’t had the tax and city incentives to create a district, what we have ended up with has been very artist originated/controlled DIY. It feels sincere because it is. We do have the Gay Street 100 block arts “anchor”, but all the random other locations have all been created by local, not “artificially imported” artists. Other locations are in pre-existing businesses. The University’s art dept. and grad students run wild with these places-visiting artists from the sister school in Poland always have a place to show. There are no martinis, but seeing a cool exhibit from an emergent artist in a hairdressing salon with PBR’s on ice in the hairwashing sinks, or other progressive art in small galleries in odd studio and warehouse spaces scattered thoughout downtown is sustainable, and will continue to be because we don’t have any government support. We collectively made a pact a few years back: Tax incentives and grants are artificial, and if you depend on them, you will be doomed if they are suddenly withdrawn. Just DIY in the dirt and on a shoestring and you will survive. I do love Chattanooga-the Hunter is a wonderful museum and Ruth Grover is doing a kick-ass job at UTC bringing in amazing exhibits, but the chrome and steel renovation of Main Street is like putting Valentino on an old ho-it don’t look right and it ain’t gonna feed the hooker.

]]> By: lupe http://www.artandwork.us/2009/11/lost-south/comment-page-1/#comment-566 lupe Tue, 16 Feb 2010 02:29:05 +0000 http://www.artandwork.us/?p=146#comment-566 I started my retreat from the "art world" about 8 years ago. I thought through art I would find a great exchange of ideas but like you write, a lot of empty feelings, esp. the art parties & openings. At the time I was, unfortunately, self-conscious about my critical stances. Friends thought me too critical - unable to have gratitude for the artistic opportunities I did have or they dismissed my concerns and reflections about artmaking & art institutions as auto talk about commercialism, capitalism, etc. I thought about it deeply & frequently but never found anyone to discuss it with seriously or willing to reflect on their own artmaking & reasons for it. I fell into a funk & pretty much stopped making art even though those around me kept telling me "you just have to keep doing it". Their mode of showing support I suppose. Or else it was, "well maybe you just don't have any ideas" or "if someone really wants to do something they just do it" (isn't that a nike slogan?) Pure frustration either way. So I write this long comment to say I appreciate your words and reflections. And congratulations on finding people whom share your concern with social practice and whom you can work with. I started my retreat from the “art world” about 8 years ago. I thought through art I would find a great exchange of ideas but like you write, a lot of empty feelings, esp. the art parties & openings. At the time I was, unfortunately, self-conscious about my critical stances. Friends thought me too critical – unable to have gratitude for the artistic opportunities I did have or they dismissed my concerns and reflections about artmaking & art institutions as auto talk about commercialism, capitalism, etc. I thought about it deeply & frequently but never found anyone to discuss it with seriously or willing to reflect on their own artmaking & reasons for it. I fell into a funk & pretty much stopped making art even though those around me kept telling me “you just have to keep doing it”. Their mode of showing support I suppose. Or else it was, “well maybe you just don’t have any ideas” or “if someone really wants to do something they just do it” (isn’t that a nike slogan?)
Pure frustration either way.
So I write this long comment to say I appreciate your words and reflections. And congratulations on finding people whom share your concern with social practice and whom you can work with.

]]> By: Kelly Pope http://www.artandwork.us/2009/11/lost-south/comment-page-1/#comment-440 Kelly Pope Mon, 25 Jan 2010 15:57:47 +0000 http://www.artandwork.us/?p=146#comment-440 I hear you. I am a second-year student at SAIC, and I'm from Jacksonville, Florida--a place rife with its own intentional historical/cultural amnesia. A place that suffers from creative exodus by not providing incentive (challenging higher education, specifically an MFA program, as well as studio and gallery spaces) for creative-types to stay. Jacksonville has the full art magnet school thing going--two elementary, one middle, one high school for the visual and performing arts. Reading this post made me remember I am a product of the magnet program (middle and high school), and that magnet schools, regardless of intellectual focus, are always reconstructed from a failing school, in a dilapidated neighborhood (of which Jacksonville has a surplus). The intent is to bring attention to those neighborhoods, I guess, but I can testify that nothing off school property has ever been "improved"--that those neighborhoods stay dilapidated. Starting the gentrification when the artists are young, eh? Or priming us for living in underserved communities? I'll be honest. I have lived in the same house all of my life (when I am not at school). Twenty-one years ago, the house was surrounded by only a few other small neighborhoods, and more farmland. Now, that side of town is known as a suburban hell, which it sort of is. And I could move out, and almost want to move out, and start making art about "what I really want to make art about"--but right now I really want to make art about sprawl, neglected space, reclaiming lost knowledge, etc. As development projects lose funding, as people stop buying McMansions, what will be left of that land? Will rent prices go down as the bubble deflates? Seems sometimes the suburbs of today become the ramshackle hoods of tomorrow. I hear you. I am a second-year student at SAIC, and I’m from Jacksonville, Florida–a place rife with its own intentional historical/cultural amnesia. A place that suffers from creative exodus by not providing incentive (challenging higher education, specifically an MFA program, as well as studio and gallery spaces) for creative-types to stay. Jacksonville has the full art magnet school thing going–two elementary, one middle, one high school for the visual and performing arts. Reading this post made me remember I am a product of the magnet program (middle and high school), and that magnet schools, regardless of intellectual focus, are always reconstructed from a failing school, in a dilapidated neighborhood (of which Jacksonville has a surplus). The intent is to bring attention to those neighborhoods, I guess, but I can testify that nothing off school property has ever been “improved”–that those neighborhoods stay dilapidated. Starting the gentrification when the artists are young, eh? Or priming us for living in underserved communities?
I’ll be honest. I have lived in the same house all of my life (when I am not at school). Twenty-one years ago, the house was surrounded by only a few other small neighborhoods, and more farmland. Now, that side of town is known as a suburban hell, which it sort of is. And I could move out, and almost want to move out, and start making art about “what I really want to make art about”–but right now I really want to make art about sprawl, neglected space, reclaiming lost knowledge, etc. As development projects lose funding, as people stop buying McMansions, what will be left of that land? Will rent prices go down as the bubble deflates? Seems sometimes the suburbs of today become the ramshackle hoods of tomorrow.

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