Picture this: You're an artist living in the Fort Point Area of South Boston, the largest arts community in New England. In about a month, the lease on your studio is going to expire. You might find yourself out on the street. In place of where your cozy little apartment was will be a spacious parking lot or high-rise dot-com office. The measly income you make as a struggling musician or painter will never be enough to cover rent and bills. Does the city of Boston care?
Well, only in a rather disinterested and distant manner. City officials seem to be taking this housing crisis for Boston artists perhaps a little less seriously than they should. Beacon Capital Partners, a Boston real estate development firm, unveiled a $300 million proposal last month that would include a massive office complex that would provide up to 120 loft spaces for artists. But local artists and Fort Point cultural organizations do not see the developer's plan as an adequate solution to what they feel is a greater problem.
Jed Speare of Mobius, an artist-run center for experimental work in all media, said in a recent article in South Boston Online that these realtors do not quite understand the seriousness of the housing shortage that artists are currently facing.
"I want people to understand that this is a serious displacement issue for us, this isn't just a bunch of whiney artists causing a stir," he wrote.
More than 300 artists are at risk of losing their homes. Part of the problem lies in the unfortunate fact that the Boston Wharf company owns 95 percent of the residencies in which artists and artists studios reside. The company is not terribly concerned about the fate of its 500 residents, all who run a serious danger of being evicted in the next four years, as rents quadruple and leases expire.
This August, groups such as the Revolving Museum and Artists for Humanity, which advocate public art and teen projects around the city, will lose their leases. The Fort Point District could turn from being the artistic center of Boston to a tidy version of Wall Street. Seems like it's out with the artists, in with the engineers and men in suits.
There is definitely something wrong with this picture. After all, this is Boston we're talking about folks. Aren't we supposed to be one of the cultural capitals of the northeast? Shouldn't we be deeply concerned about the well-being of the artists who provide the cultural vibe and energy that so defines the city of Boston?
This is exactly what the Fort Point Cultural Coalition, a neighborhood artists group, thinks. They believe that the Beacon plan is only a starting point and they would like to make the project more expansive. Ideally, they would like to see not only lofts for artists, but performance, exhibit, and office spaces for a wide variety of cultural groups and nonprofit arts groups. They want to purchase four buildings from the developer, giving artists 250,000 square feet to work with. This is only part of the Coalition's plan to eventually purchase around 500,000-6000,000 square feet in the Fort Point area.
But there's a slight problem. The Coalition may want to buy this space, but the developers aren't willing to sell it. Turns out that their idealistic plan to revive the Fort Point area may not be so realistic. They could even turn out to be merely a pipedream. That's thanks to the hard-line attitude of Beacon Capital developers who claim that they are doing more than enough for the arts community in Fort Point. They believe that they're making housing affordable for artists.
And while one cannot deny their claim, it seems painfully obvious that more needs to be done to help struggling artists. The housing shortage is city wide, and serious. Hundreds of artists cannot find an affordable place to live. What the Beacon developers are planning to do is only a drop in the bucket compared with what needs to be done to ensure that these artists have a place to live and display their art.
The Fort Point Cultural Coalition wants to ensure that the cultural community does not die. More than that, they want to create a vibrant, artistic neighborhood. Should the fate of Boston artists be in the hands of Beacon Capital developer Alan Leventhal?
The city of Boston is taking too passive a role in the future of artists. Boston lags behind cities like New York, San Francisco, and Providence, where city officials take an active role in ensuring that the arts are a top priority.
Perhaps Boston should look to New York for inspiration. For example, the $31 million 42nd Street Studios building that houses 14 rehearsal studios, six offices for nonprofit arts group, and a 199-seat theater, is more along the lines of what Boston should be ultimately aiming for. That is exactly the message the Fort Point Cultural Coalition is trying to get across to developers. They believe that there is no reason that Boston should lag behind these cities. It is all a matter of vision. But vision is what the city seems to be lacking.
Granted, city officials took a step in the right direction when they appointed Esther Kaplan as commissioner of the Mayer's Office of Cultural Affairs after the position was vacant for two years. Hopefully, she will be able to increase the city's commitment to the artistic community. But I wonder how much impact she will really have and how seriously she'll be taken. Only time can tell.
This city-wide housing crisis is not going to go away. But the artists might. And that's a serious problem. Something that Esther Kaplan, Mayor Menino, and developers in the Fort Point Area must address. We're already tearing up the landscape of Boston with the Big Dig. Let's not tear out the heart and soul of Boston by forcing these artists out onto the streets.
