Metropolitics

Sheffield Music Factory: The Legacy of Red Tape Studios

Sam Holden — 2025-01-07T12:00:24Z

Opening in 1986, in defiance of government cuts, Red Tape Studios was the first municipal recording studio in the UK. Sam Holden demonstrates how the studio brought together the city council, third sector, and community in a time of ideological individualism, drawing lessons for the renewed, contemporary interest of municipal socialism in the UK.
Opening in 1986, Red Tape Studios was the first municipal recording studio in the UK (Wichelow 2023). Named in a council paper as the Sheffield

- Essays / music, arts, arts district, arts-centered development, municipal socialism, deindustrialization, Sheffield, England, United Kingdom

Industrial Wasteland and the Commons

Jules Desgoutte & translated by Oliver Waine — 2021-02-26T06:00:00Z

Long considered places of experimentation, sharing and freedom, friches culturelles, or temporary cultural spaces, seem to have become tools of metropolitan attractiveness, resulting in gentrification and increased real-estate values. Jules Desgoutte looks at the reasons for this transformation and examines the strategies of resistance at play.
Long considered places of experimentation, sharing and freedom, friches culturelles, or temporary cultural spaces, seem to have become tools of

- From the Field / communs, friches, culture, arts, urbanisme transitoire, urbanisme temporaire

Teaching Art and the History of Tattoos at Rikers Island: An Interview with Tamara Santibanez

Lisa Jean Moore — 2019-01-22T06:00:00Z

An interview with Tamara Santibanez, who teaches art and the cultural and social history of tattoos to youth offenders at Rikers Island prison, explains how tattoos can help develop visual literacy and explores tattooing's potential to empower inmates both personally and professionally.
Arts programs in jails and prisons support the therapeutic, developmental, and vocational goals of incarcerated persons. Artists are uniquely positioned to help prisoners express their identities, address

- Interviews / United States, New York, art, artist, arts, prison, education, art worlds, art economies, tattoos, youth offenders, Rikers Island

Shanghai's West Bund Cultural Corridor Exemplifies the Opportunities and Risks of State-Driven Cultural Development

Siqi Tu — 2018-05-08T05:00:00Z

The West Bund Cultural Corridor in Shanghai is the latest entrant in a global competition to attract investment by combining cultural institutions with real-estate megaprojects. But arrangements between the corridor's private art museums and institutions of the local and national state remain ambiguous, raising questions about economic elitism and artistic freedom.
China's contemporary art scene is on the rise, as is the number of private museums in China, most notably in Shanghai. The Long

- From the Field / culture, urban development, China, development, neoliberalism, arts, global cities, Shanghai, cultural district, arts district, arts-centered development, cultural corridor

The Happy Few and the Unhappy Many: Endangered Artists in Global Cities

Boris Grésillon & translated by John Barrett — 2017-06-15T07:00:00Z

While participating or having participated in reshaping urban spaces, artists seem to be increasingly driven away from city centers due to steep rents and are forced move farther and farther from the heart of metropolises. Will the global contemporary city, like the mythical figure Cronus devouring his own children, exclude its artists? Boris Grésillon examines the dynamics at work in four metropolitan centers: New York, London, Tokyo, and Paris.
The global city (Sassen 1991) is predominantly

- Essays / gentrification, Paris, London, New York, art, downtown, city centre, Tokyo, rental, right to the city, artist, arts, rent, global cities

The Arts as Fundamental—and Fragile—in Community Life

Andrew Zitcer & Julie Hawkins & Neville Vakharia — 2017-02-22T06:00:00Z

Arts funding in America mirrors the inequality found in society more broadly. Yet amid persistent poverty and other challenges, West Philadelphia residents assert that arts access and participation are central to their conception of a life well-lived. Andrew Zitcer, Julie Hawkins and Neville Vakharia discuss their research in West Philadelphia, noting the vibrant cultural production taking place there and maintaining that arts should be considered a fundamental right.
Amid the existential

- Essays / culture, United States, art, artist, arts, community, Philadelphia, community development, community arts

Citadels, Cores, and Confetti: Urban Festivals in the New Political Economy of the Music Industry

Johan Jansson — 2017-01-05T20:07:54Z

How have changes in the music industry—especially regarding the way music is produced and consumed today—affected urban spaces and the production of the city more generally? In his review of Jonathan Wynn's Music/City, Johan Jansson examines the wider urban context surrounding music and the city, and in particular the impact on local communities of the ever-growing number of music festivals taking place in and around urban areas.
In recent years, the music industry has undergone thorough

- Reviews / public space, placemaking, culture, United States, Austin, arts, music, festivals, cultural policy, production of the city, Nashville, Newport (Rhode Island), festivalization

“We Are the Scene”: Alternative Art Economies in Bushwick

Mary Kosut — 2016-09-13T05:00:00Z

Artists and art communities are essential to the cultural life of cities. In New York City, artists have created networks of artist-run galleries in unlikely spaces that are outside the corporate gallery system. Sociologist Mary Kosut explores how artists generate alternative urban art economies within the contemporary New York art world.
Art scenes are integral to urban cultural centers—Berlin, Paris, London, and New York are defined by vibrant artist communities. As an art capital, New York

- From the Field / gentrification, culture, New York, art, culture-based economy, artist, arts, Brooklyn, art worlds, galleries, art economies, Bushwick

Arts Districts Without Artists

Meghan Ashlin Rich — 2015-03-23T05:55:00Z

Numerous studies have examined gentrification's harmful effects for low-income residents, but few examine the consequences for its “pioneers,” the artists who jump-start the process. Focusing on a Baltimore neighborhood turned “Arts & Entertainment District,” sociologist Meghan Ashlin Rich shows what happens when artists' work intertwines with the city's agenda for revitalization.
A “naturally occurring” Arts & Entertainment District is born in Baltimore
Baltimore's Station North

- From the Field / gentrification, culture, United States, Baltimore, culture-based economy, artist, arts, Arts & Entertainment District, cultural district, arts district, arts-centered development