As national media focus more attention in our city's direction for a regrettable reason, there are (cliche alert) blessings in disguise.
The latest bright spot has this New York Times headline: As Detroit Flounders, Its Art Scene Flourishes.
Hey, what's not to like about coverage that shows (alert #2) our glass is half-full?
The bankruptcy has added an odd layer onto what has become a thriving, albeit complicated, local art scene.
Detroit’s dismal financial situation has been a subject of minimal regard for many artists, who said that their city is far from the ghost town some might assume from the news. They point out that a rich cultural undercurrent has grown only stronger in recent years, with a rise in contemporary art. They say that the arts, in the end, may propel economic development in Detroit, as it has from Asheville, N.C., to Bilbao, Spain.
George N'Namdi created the N'Namdi Center for Contemporary Art. [Facebook photo]
In a roundup for this coming Sunday's travel section, writer Cortney Balestier talks with:
- Gallery founder George N’Namdi
- Detroit-born photographer Sebastian Sullen of Ferndale
- Midtown art dealer Monica Bowman of The Butcher's Daughter on Cass
- Jeanette Pierce of D:hive
- Tourism booster Renee Monforton.
She ticks off examples of good news:
Artists have flocked to cheap rents and have converted shuttered storefronts and abandoned buildings into studio spaces and galleries as private money has poured into the local art scene. . . .
Red Bull opened its first domestic House of Art, an emerging-artist incubator, here in May 2012.
Several suburban galleries have moved back to the city, and arts hubs are solidifying.
-- Alan Stamm
The Butcher's Daughter, a new gallery on Cass Avenue, this summer hosted a five-week exhibition by Robert Platt titled "Insubstantial Pageants of The Mind's Eye."
