Artists in Vancouver say they are struggling to find permanent spaces to create their art amid rising rents and increasing development.
Some local artists are questioning the future of art in Vancouver if the displacement for artists and creators continues.
The Eastside Culture Crawl Society, now known as the Eastside Arts Society, produced a report in 2019 highlighting the growing number of displaced artists. It called on the city to implement policies to protect and expand spaces for artists.
The report estimated 400,000 square feet of artist production space was lost over the previous 10 years. Since then, an additional 50,000 to 60,000 additional square feet of artist space has been lost, according to Esther Rausenberg, art director and executive director of the Eastside Arts Society.
“Like with everything else in the city, affordability, development is a big issue,” Rausenberg told CBC’s The Early Edition on Monday.
“A lot of the artist studio spaces are on commercial and industrial lands. A lot of these spaces are in two, three-storey kind of cinder block buildings, and those are coming down as we’re seeing higher developments on those buildings.”
The Early Edition8:57Vancouver Artists Struggle with Studio Spaces
Artists in Vancouver are struggling because of the lack of spaces and financial uncertainties. We spoke to Esther Rausenberg, Artistic and Executive Director of the Eastside Culture Crawl. And Oliver Harwood, an artist in Vancouver, about the future of Vancouver’s art scene.
Rausenberg says part of the problem is that the developments are not rezoning developments, so they don’t have to apply community amenity contributions that help with the building of facilities such as affordable housing, parks, child care, and arts and culture spaces.
The Old Foundry on Vernon Drive served as a home for a number of local artists. (Wendy D)
Industrial areas a hub for creativity, says artist
Among the lost artist spaces is The Old Foundry Building on Vernon Drive.
Sculptor Oliver Harwood says a year ago, he and other artists in the building were asked to leave to make way for a new commercial building.
“We really rely on the old warehouse, the old industrial areas in order to thrive as artists, so this was a big loss for us,” Harwood said.
He says it took months for artists to find new spaces. In his case, he searched from Squamish to Langley before finally finding a place in East Vancouver.
“We have just recently got word that we might have one year left in this space and then have to move again,” he said.
Esther Rausenberg of the Eastside Arts Society says the city has tools to preserve spaces for artists. (Maryse Zeidler/CBC)
Rausenberg says it’s important for creators, particularly those like sculptors who used specialized equipment, to have workspaces that offer some stability.
“Artists don’t want to be and can’t be picking up shop in a little suitcase and moving from one venue to the next,” she said. “Those are temporary solutions.”
City has tools to preserve space, says artist
Rausenberg says more needs to be done to prevent Vancouver from becoming a “city without art.”
Rausenberg says the society is developing a new Eastside Arts District initiative aimed at preserving artist spaces and developing new ones.
She said the city has tools to preserve space, such as density bonusing, which allows for additional floor area in exchange for amenities, as well as community amenity contributions and tax relief.
Alix Sales, senior planner for the City of Vancouver, says the city is looking at ways to create space for artists, including density bonuses.
Sales says the city provides $1.5 million a year in infrastructure grants. It also provides 1.3 million square feet of cultural space at low cost to artists and arts organizations.
She says the displacement of artists is a global phenomenon, and she hopes Vancouver can avoid the fate of large cities such as London, New York and Paris.
“Artists don’t live in those cities anymore or work there,” Sales said. “They have to work outside those cities because they can’t afford to be there.”
Harwood says artists contribute to the fabric of a city, and he hopes to remain in Vancouver.
“I know from my colleagues we love to be in the city, and we want to stay here.
That’s not the question. The question is just finding the space to be able to stay.”
LONDON (AP) — With a few daubs of a paintbrush, the Brontë sisters have got their dots back.
More than eight decades after it was installed, a memorial to the three 19th-century sibling novelists in London’s Westminster Abbey was amended Thursday to restore the diaereses – the two dots over the e in their surname.
The dots — which indicate that the name is pronounced “brontay” rather than “bront” — were omitted when the stone tablet commemorating Charlotte, Emily and Anne was erected in the abbey’s Poets’ Corner in October 1939, just after the outbreak of World War II.
They were restored after Brontë historian Sharon Wright, editor of the Brontë Society Gazette, raised the issue with Dean of Westminster David Hoyle. The abbey asked its stonemason to tap in the dots and its conservator to paint them.
“There’s no paper record for anyone complaining about this or mentioning this, so I just wanted to put it right, really,” Wright said. “These three Yorkshire women deserve their place here, but they also deserve to have their name spelled correctly.”
It’s believed the writers’ Irish father Patrick changed the spelling of his surname from Brunty or Prunty when he went to university in England.
Raised on the wild Yorkshire moors, all three sisters died before they were 40, leaving enduring novels including Charlotte’s “Jane Eyre,” Emily’s “Wuthering Heights” and Anne’s “The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.”
Rebecca Yorke, director of the Brontë Society, welcomed the restoration.
“As the Brontës and their work are loved and respected all over the world, it’s entirely appropriate that their name is spelled correctly on their memorial,” she said.
