Artists and Gentrification

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-role-artists-play-gentrification?fbclid=IwAR3XcI8v0k9U_-8s2TCO4ZGxfGy0GwrT8OWGpIBlKpX0UNPe43M6kV4hr6M


Kara Walker's Marvelous Sugar Baby installation as part of the publicity campaign for a few new developments by the Brooklyn riverfront by the real estate company Two Trees (image courtesy of gigi_nyu on Flickr).

My client for a city planning group project-course this semester is a borough in Montgomery County: Ambler, known for its live arts. Our planning team has envisioned enhancing Ambler's art resources and make the borough an artist heaven. However, the question of gentrification surfaces as other planning teams and instructors critiques our proposals. Here is an interesting article dissecting the relationships among long-term residents, artists, and real-estate developers of gentrifying, art-centered neighborhoods. I do wonder if a neighborhood have incoming artists whose work are primarily digitally-focused, will that have a stronger or lesser gentrifying effect?

-Zé