celerated than that of Lowertown. Minneapolitans no longer recognize the North Loop as an artist or arts hub. Through Lowertown’s more gradual renewal, public, philanthropic, and private sector entities continued to prioritize affordable housing and artist live/work space. Today, the North Loop hosts a shiny new baseball stadium and a light rail station. Light rail looms near for Lowertown and a stadium may also be in the cards. Artspace Projects converted three historic warehouses into artist spaces in these different contexts. Remaining mindful of the unique factors working in tandem with the artist spaces to strengthen or limit outcomes, better equips us to understand the artist spaces’ significance and singular contributions.
The Northern, Tilsner, and Traffic Zone The Northern, Tilsner and Traffic Zone vary remarkably, even though two of the projects, the Northern and Tilsner, literally abut each other. The Northern and Tilsner’s development occurred part and parcel with Lowertown’s revitalization efforts. In contrast, the Traffic Zone allowed a group of mid-career, North Loop artists to secure studio space against a tide of rising rents and condo conversions. The Northern, Artspace’s first project, features commercial tenants on the first two floors. The Tilsner is solely artist live/work space. Artspace financed both these projects with Low-Income Housing Tax Credits, and as such, residents must meet income restrictions to become tenants. The Traffic Zone serves a much smaller number of artists; twenty-three artists co-own the building with Artspace, and the building is strictly non-residential. Below, we spell out the reasons for the projects’ inceptions and examine their evolutions.
Northern Warehouse Artists’ Cooperative Photo © Sean Smuda, seansmuda.com, 2009
Northern Warehouse Artists’ Cooperative: The Model, the Guinea Pig A handsome, red brick façade encompasses the Northern Warehouse’s 161,280 square feet. The upper four floors host 52 artist live/work units, and commercial tenants occupy the first two floors, including a Zen Center, the Black Dog Café, Tanpopo Noodle Shop, and arts organizations, studios, schools, and galleries. At Springboard for the Arts, an artist service organization located in the building, residents take advantage of workshops and an artist resource center. The Northern’s artists span a range of artistic disciplines and ages, but survey findings suggest the majority are visual artists and white (Table 1). (Interestingly, survey findings for all three spaces reflect higher proportions of racial and ethnic minorities as well as visual artists, people age 45 or older and women, than the artist population for the overall Twin Cities metro as of the 2000 Census (Table 1)). Artist residents enjoy easy access to downtown and the St. Paul Farmer’s Market, located kitty-corner from the 25