Richard Florida: “When you think of new forms of artistic and cultural expression, where do they come from? They don’t come from yuppie, gentrified neighborhoods, they come from the streets. And one of the points I try to make in the book is that Arts organizations and cultural organizations, as well as economic development organizations and state and local government, have to get their eyes off the one ball or two balls they know how to focus on. They know how to support the Symphony, the Opera and the Ballet, and in addition build convention centers and stadiums. But what I’m trying to say in the book is that you have to support local-level, street-level creativity. The more investments we make in street-level culture arts, music, writing… not only the more creative that community will be, it will be the kind of community that all sorts of creative sorts will want to move to, and that will be the community that will attract new innovations… new companies.”
This installment of the Richmond Arts Flashback shines a spotlight on the arts as a vibrant and complex economic engine. And what better way to do that than to re-introduce Richard Florida, the man who put “street-level art” into the lexicon along with the term, “Creative Class.”
It’s interesting how many times those phrases, and Florida’s name, have been bandied about over the past half-decade — not least during Richmond’s last Mayoral election, where no fewer than three of the candidates cited him by name (including our current Mayor-elect). Dr. Florida has been a popular reference point for local politicians and movers and shakers ever since his much-ballyhooed appearance in 2003; his buzzphrases have been dropped into the public conversation over the past years to justify everything from new condos to a downtown arts center to the latest coffeehouse opening up down the street.
These days, Florida is the head of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto, and he has his own consulting and lecturing firm, the Creative Class Group. He’s written several books on his theories of the economic revitalization of cities. and has often argued against the building of huge cultural centers and sports stadiums in lieu of fostering a diverse, inclusive community where new ideas and voices can more easily “plug in.” His prescriptions include encouraging an indigenous, organic “street-level” arts and music scene — galleries, restaurants, clubs, coffeehouses — and emphasizing quality of life issues such as the cultivation of green space, bike lanes and parks.
Save Richmond has been intigued by the good doctor’s work ever since we started blogging five years ago, but we’re equally as intrigued by his critics. Steven Malanga, in a piece called “The Curse of the Creative Class,” warned that Florida’s theories were often so open-ended that they could be used to justify almost anything “artistic.” Little ol’ towns like Richmond can easily hear one visiting lecture and get confused something awful:
It is exactly because Florida is an exponent of this kind of aggressive, government-directed economic development (albeit with a New Age spin) that liberal policymakers and politicians have latched on to his theories so enthusiastically. To them, an expanding government is always more interesting than an expanding economy — especially if economic growth depends on something so very uninteresting as low taxes and small government. But it is just as likely that the Floridazed brand of aggressive governing will get things as wrong as the builders of sports stadiums and convention centers.
One clear example of how things are likely to go wrong is in Richmond, Virginia, where the city fathers and local economic-development types (touting Florida’s ideas) are trying to revive their downtown by making it a trendy arts district. To finance its efforts, the town recently passed a restaurant tax and is now contemplating raising its hotel taxes — to the howls of local businesses. “They haven’t figured out that those tax increases will probably kill as many jobs as their plan will create,” says Scott Moody, a senior economist with the Tax Foundation.
At a time when the arts community is alternately tallying up surveys for cultural action plans and taking huge funding hits… at a time when citizens are debating another baseball stadium proposal in Shockoe and watching our community-led Downtown Plan get watered down by development interests… and while we are all waiting for some “seriously secretive fun” with the Symphony, Opera and Ballet… we might want to revisit the words of Richard Florida and make sure we’ve got them right before we use him as a reference point for any of this stuff. Don’t you think?
In 2003, I wrote a Back Page for Style Weekly following Richard Florida’s local appearance and noted how he and Richmond weren’t exactly a natural fit. An excerpt:
The Jan. 31 speech prompted advance newspaper ads that sought personal stories from Richmond’s “gays, rock bands and weirdoes.” All to satisfy the visiting keynote speaker, a professor of regional economic development at Carnegie-Mellon University and in-demand social planner. Richard Florida has isolated an emerging sector of societal movers and shakers in America — the creative class — and citizens like these, normally shunned or ignored by powerful business consortiums, are an integral part of the professor’s theories on city revitalization.
Inside the newly-renovated Greater Richmond Convention Center, at the region’s annual business meeting, Florida laid out his findings. “I feel a little bit like a preacher,” he laughed after one particularly breathless monologue that argued for more emphasis on bike paths, music scenes and gay tolerance and less on big downtown renovation projects.
The sermon was based not on platitudes but on carefully-calibrated data and numerous real-world examples, all documented in “The Rise of the Creative Class” (Basic Books). Florida’s research shows that flourishing cities — Austin, San Francisco, Boston — have “low entry barriers” where visionary entrepreneurs (like, say, former “weirdo” Bill Gates) can plug in easily. Successful cities share common traits but Florida doesn’t just isolate the phenomenon, he instructs cities on how to lure and keep creative talent. Out: Fake downtowns, mall-like structures and closed-door environments. In: tolerant, eclectic places that hold a range of recreational options, lifestyles and cultures.
Pacing and bobbing, well-armed with anecdotes, preaching inclusion and diversity, Florida did come off like a preacher. He’d done this before. And with the wide-eyed sincerity of a repentant Sunday morning pew, there was rapture from the distinguished Richmond congregation. Heads nodded, books were sold, and everyone — from successful businessmen to the mayor himself — concurred enthusiastically during the Q&A period: “Yes, Professor”… “Where do we throw money?”… “What ideas!”… “Tolerance”… local music!”
Apparently, Southern hospitality was at a premium. Matching key points in the professor’s presentation with Richmond reality — before and after the applause — a sensible person would have to wonder if this crowd really understood what they were clapping for.
Click here to read my essay on Richard Florida’s appearance in Richmond, “Contemplating Petersburg.”
Read an excerpt from Richard Florida’s book, “The Rise of the Creative Class,” right here. And you can visit his “Creative Class” website by clicking on this spot.
And how about the avalanche of cultural avatars and consultants that followed in Florida’s wake, echoing his themes that Richmond needed to actively encourage its community arts scene and to open up to new voices? By clicking here, you can meet these enlightened visitors, re-visit their words and be introduced to “The Richmond Paradox.”
Still can’t understand why hiring that freaky goth kid with the earring might just save your company, and also help to bring better coffee options and more high-tech industries to your immediate area? Click here to read this new Arts and Humanities Research Council report on the arts and innovation.
Richmond’s establishment isn’t the only one wrestling with (or namedropping) Richard Florida’s theories. Click here and read about the Milwaukee Cultural Alliance, and how their “Cultural Action Plan” has ignored community, street-level art at its peril:
The Cultural Alliance, whose job it is to “strengthen, advance and represent the arts and culture sector as an essential asset for growing a vibrant, attractive region” is either unwilling to challenge Milwaukee’s obsolete establishment or else they aren’t even aware of how the creative class relates to economic growth. They focus all their attention on…big organizations, as though these are the only existing relevant cultural assets, when, in reality from the creative class perspective, they are the least relevant.
In the next series of posts, Save Richmond’s Richmond Arts Flashback, will document the city’s rich and colorful history of community “street-level art,” including several of today’s successful examples. And it’s all in anticipation of Richmond’s forthcoming “Cultural Action Plan.”
Previous installments of the Flashback can be found here, here, here and here