EVERETT – Huge, huge, huge.
That’s how city leaders and artists characterize the news that Artspace Projects has selected Everett for an affordable living and working space for artists and arts organizations.
The nonprofit Minnesota group could begin fund-raising efforts as soon as March 1, said Judy Tuohy, executive director of the Arts Council of Snohomish County. Artspace typically rehabilitates old industrial buildings, turning them into artists’ lofts.
“We’re really pleased and excited that Artspace has selected Everett,” said Tuohy, whose organization will participate in the project.
In a letter to the mayor on Feb. 14, Artspace’s president, L. Kelley Lindquist, and board chairwoman, Rebecca Yanisch, said the nonprofit agency looks forward to creating a “major, new arts facility” here.
“Each year, Artspace receives more invitations from communities across the country and abroad than it can accept,” Lindquist and Yanisch wrote.
Only about four sites are picked each year, city officials have said.
“Everett has impressed us with the strength of its arts community, the possibilities for funding and sustaining the project in your region, and the vision of your community leaders,” Lindquist and Yanisch wrote.
The firm, which started developing affordable and sustainable space for artists in the mid-1980s, has completed 27 such projects across the country and has more than two dozen in the works.
Community leaders hope the Artspace project will provide the nucleus – the “critical art mass” – for an art district that will draw artists and art patrons from across the region.
“A project like this, with artist live-work space, production space and a new home for the arts council, will absolutely change our regional image,” said Lanie McMullin, the city’s executive director.
“I want to be first on the list to live there,” said local artist Kim Groff-Harrington, who makes art out of recycled materials.
Apart from affordable rent, Groff-Harrington said there is a long list of direct and indirect benefits artists can glean from the project. Having that many artists under one roof will generate enormous creative energy, she said.
Groff-Harrington lives in Everett and is using a family member’s garage in Lynnwood as her studio. She displays her work at Kindred Circle Art Gallery in Edmonds and Revolution Gallery in Issaquah.
“Oh my gosh, it’s exciting,” she said. “It could be a destination.”
To get started in Everett, Artspace requires a $150,000 down payment and another $300,000 by the end of the year. The money would pay for expenses such as market studies and choosing and evaluating a building, said Karen Shaw, Everett’s director of economic development and human needs.
The Arts Council of Snohomish County will put up $50,000 of the down payment. Tuohy will ask the City Council at its meeting today to pitch in the remaining $100,000.
If the council agrees, the arts council, city staff and Artspace will look at more specific ways to raise money for the project.
How many artists participate in the project and how much money Artspace kicks in are yet to be determined. But the $16.5 million, 50-unit Tashiro Kaplan lofts in Seattle is to date the largest venture by Artspace Projects. About 75 people, including the artists and their families, occupy the lofts.
Setting up Artspace will take about two years, but the group’s goal is to provide affordable housing to artists for 50 years. The firm is looking at several buildings, including two in downtown Everett and one near Everett Station, Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson said.
“I have a poet and budding novelist who lives in my basement,” Stephanson said of his son, Joseph, 24. “There are, I’m sure, many artists in our community that never had a chance to pursue their interest because they couldn’t afford it.”
Stephanson said he looks forward to working with Artspace.
“For them to see the potential of Everett speaks volumes to the renewal that’s going on in our community,” he said.
Reporter Jennifer Warnick: 425-339-3429 or jwarnick@heraldnet.com.
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