The Creative City: An exploration of the utopian idea of the creative city, where artists and arts organizations are viewed as critical components of a healthy ecosystem. We’ll ask what role the arts sector can play in civic creativity or cultural strategy that creates social wealth and helps shape public sentiment, city planning and policy. We will also discuss the robust migration of the technology community from Silicon Valley to San Francisco and Oakland and the eect it’s had on the non-prot and commercial arts sector. Could we have predicted the challenges? How can we move forward? Can a revived social logic, balancing independence and interdependence cultivate resilience for artists, arts and culture workers and arts organizations?

2014-15 Creative City Fellows

Selected Readings

The Creative City by Charles Landry p.11-31 (artists p. 15) | Knight Cities: A conversation with Deborah Cullinan | Knight Cities: A conversation with Theaster Gates | Creative but Poor? Yep, the ‘Creative Class’ Has Its Class Divide By Geoff Dembicki

Books: The Rise of the Creative Class by Richard Florida | Why Richard Florida’s Honeymoon is Over By Murray Whyte | Struggling with the Creative Class By Jamie Peck | Diary By Rebecca Solnit | The Bacon wrapped Economy By Ellen Cushing | Wealth and the City by Emmanuel Rodriguez.

Healthy Arts Ecosystem By  | Why Middle-Class Americans Can’t Afford to Live in Liberal Cities by Derek Thompson | SF Isn’t the Only Unaffordable City by Peter Lawrence Kane

The Creative City – 2015 Fellowship Project

As Creative City Fellows, we created an evening of collaborative art-making, local food, fun, and reflection in a beautiful, tucked-away garden. Late Nite Art (http://lateniteart.com) brings people together to “unleash creativity within groups.” Artists and non-artists alike sit together at a long table to paint, draw, and bond over the same piece of butcher paper. We offered a twist on this social art party with the help of Late Nite Art founder, Adam Rosendahl. We sparked a lively discussion on the displacement of populations and arts professionals in the Bay Area—and the role of art and creative urban spaces to build and sustain our communities. Our collective artwork is infused with these conversations. It is on display in the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts for EAP/SFBA’s 5th annual Emergence. See the Event Page for details on Sketching the Creative City, May 16, 2015

Creative City Fellows (2014-15) Host a Late Nite Art (facilitated by Adam Rosendahl) focused on home, displacement, the shifts in SF culture and connecting with new people! Sat. May 16, 2015

Posted by Emerging Arts Professionals - SFBA on Monday, May 18, 2015