Community Life

We invite you to take a look at the "Community Life" feature of the Artspace website. Artspace buildings are lively, vital artist communities and our intention here is to offer a glimpse of the building-wide events and community activities happening in Artspace projects across the country.

Encouragement and sharing are a way of life at Everett Station

As real estate developers, we are invariably struck by the artistic vibrancy and community involvement that develops in Artspace projects. The community life that flourishes in Artspace buildings is rooted in the experience of artists living and working side by side.

Everett Station Lofts in Portland, Oregon, is a thriving example. During the mid-1980s, an individual bought and converted the warehouse building into an artist- housing complex. By the mid-90s the Pearl District, a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood near Everett Station, was driving real estate values up. When the owner decided to sell, the artists sought out Artspace and made the case for maintaining Everett Station as affordable space for artists. Artspace took ownership of the building in 1998.

Today Everett Station Lofts has 47 live/work spaces, 16 of which are live/work galleries. Most of the tenants are visual artists: painters, sculptors, and potters.There are fashion designers, writers, and musicians. Most are emerging artists.

The building's on-site manager, Dave Hagood, is passionate about his job. He has the right mix of technical, administrative, and social skills needed in an on-site property manager, but he also possesses a deep appreciation for the arts, and for artists particularly. Since his tenure began three years ago, the organized artist activity in the building has grown tremendously.

Under Dave's leadership, all 16 of the building's galleries participate in First Thursday, a city-wide open studio/gallery event. Every month a thousand or more
visitors come through the building's galleries on the evening of First Thursday. And last summer, for the second year, Everett Station hosted its own Open Studios event. Everyone in the building participated in getting ready. On a beautiful August day, doors opened to 1,500 guests who spent the afternoon milling around the building's beautiful center courtyard, admiring and purchasing the artwork of the artists and gallery owners. In retrospect, the artists see the event as a great success and an on-going opportunity to learn from each other, particularly in the areas of marketing, self-promotion, and sales.

The artists describe the community of Everett Station Lofts as sharing, trusting, connecting, launching, a springboard, a nucleus, and a germinating ground.

A common practice throughout the building is artists encouraging one another to exhibit. Many new tenants have never shown their art. They learn from each other, share ideas, tools, and materials. They collaborate on art works together and work as a group to organize and fundraise for shows and events. They talk of faster problem-solving, expanding their vocabularies, taking risks and gaining confidence.

"Most artists face numerous career hurdles", says Dave. "As part of a community, you get help and you learn from others, which makes a difference in whether an artist succeeds or gives up. It inspires artistic maturity, just like human maturity is inspired by being among other humans."

Everett Station's near 20-year existence as an artist facility has made an impact in the greater Portland arts community. As a space that historically houses emerging artists, the building remains an important anchor in the local scene, as a venue and structure for cutting-edge, new art. While the nearby Pearl District flourishes with more mainstream galleries, Everett Station attracts patrons, artists and gallery owners who focus on an emerging, accessible, and non-judgmental arts culture.

We at Artspace are proud to be associated with the artists in our buildings. We're inspired to be a part of something great with them, a movement that is
changing the way American artists live and work, and the way others understand, know and support artists. We're thrilled that our mission � to create, foster, and preserve affordable space for artists and arts organizations � can contribute to the growth of bustling artist communities,in Portland and all across the country.

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