Longtime Vancouver artists ousted by gentrification

by Rob Peters | November 16, 2007 at 09:54 am

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Every year Vancouver's Eastside artists open their studios and host a "Culture Crawl" to showcase the city's art. People can go check out artists and artisans in their natural environment, and even spark up a conversation with their favourite future Picasso.
Gentrification of Vancouver's traditionally bohemian hotspots, however, is dwindling their numbers.
I'm curious, is anything similar happening in the city where you live?

"If we lose this and any more buildings like this, we're going to be like just another North American suburb," Ishii told the Georgia Straight during an interview at her studio overlooking the Georgia Street Viaduct. "If this happens, the whole city will be dead."

According to Valerie Arntzen, executive director of the 11th annual Eastside Culture Crawl, the future of the grassroots visual-arts festival is threatened by the swift gentrification of Strathcona and Commercial Drive. Although the number of guests is growing, the crawl, which runs from Friday to Sunday (November 16 to 18), is losing artists.

"They're moving out of the city as costs rise," Arntzen told the Straight in an interview in her studio at 800 Keefer Street. The former film-set decorator bought the heritage building with four others for $390,000 in the mid '90s. It's now worth $1.5 million.

"At 1000 Parker [which houses 71 crawl artists] a few years ago, the rents went up to market value, so a bunch moved out then. All of Railtown [Studios, 321 Railway Street] got kicked out over the years. In the West Hastings block [across from Woodward's], they kicked out all of those artists and galleries years ago. It made us weep."

Arntzen noted that there are no more inexpensive industrial-type spaces for artists to go to except for out in the Fraser Valley.