Do Arts Industries Lead to Gentrification?

Urban revitalization projects that use arts-based industries have had mixed results and are often accused of causing gentrification and displacement. Gentrification occurs when an area “improves” its look and feel, leading a wave of higher-income groups to enter an area and to increase the cost of living there. As a result of these increases in the cost of living, people already residing in neighborhoods undergoing gentrification face potential displacement. Art institutions like museums, art venues, galleries and theaters are often expensive and lead less affluent people to believe the arts are not for them. This dynamic creates a strong association between exclusivity and the arts. The perceived correlation between arts-based industries and gentrification has grounded studies for those interested in urban cultural policy.

In a recent study, researchers Carl Grodach, Nicole Foster and James Murdoch analyzed the relationship between the arts, gentrification and displacement in neighborhoods in four major U.S. cities—Chicago, Dallas, New York and Los Angeles. The primary conclusion of the study was that gentrification predicts the growth of the arts, not the reverse. The study classified urban zip codes as “having no potential to gentrify,” “having the potential to gentrify,” “gentrifying,” “gentrified,” or “affluent.” These classifications were created by comparing neighborhood median incomes and housing values to the medians for the metropolitan area as a whole. The data also included the change in median values and number of arts establishments from 2000 to 2013. The research then analyzed the number of fine arts and commercial arts establishments in the neighborhoods.

In the four cities analyzed in the study, the researchers found that gentrified environments had led to higher arts growth. However, this larger presence did not support the conclusion that the arts had driven gentrification and displacement. In fact, they found that the reverse relationship existed and that gentrification and displacement had brought the arts. The highest concentrations of arts-based industries were in gentrified or affluent neighborhoods that had previously been segregated by wealth. Arts institutions had their highest growth rates in areas that already had shown signs of displacement. The data revealed that arts growth in gentrified areas was highest in cities that had histories of arts concentration in just a handful of affluent neighborhoods, like Chicago and Dallas. In Los Angeles and New York, arts establishments were found to be dispersed throughout a wider range of neighborhoods on the “no potential to gentrify” to “affluent” scale. The trend of increased concentration of arts in already gentrified environments was slightly smaller in metropolitan areas like New York and Los Angeles that did not already contain isolated arts hubs. Across all metropolitan areas studied, gentrification and displacement were driven by factors outside of the arts. Overall, arts growth was smallest in places that were found to have the potential to undergo gentrification but which had not done so yet. As a result, people living in gentrified or affluent neighborhoods had higher access to arts establishments than those in other areas.

Policymakers often view the arts and creative industries as tools to help revitalize neighborhoods. However, Grodach, Foster and Murdoch’s study showed that the neighborhoods that could benefit from creative revitalization had lower counts of arts establishments. Arts industries planted themselves near their typical customer base in already gentrified or affluent areas. Thus, it may be harder to place new arts programs or buildings in areas that do not have a typical arts customer base. This finding raises issues concerning who the typical arts customer is and can be, and why certain people feel the arts are not for them. Policymakers and those interested in urban inequalities should investigate this underlying disconnect between certain groups of people and the arts. Arts industries do not seem to be directly causing displacement by moving into ungentrified urban areas. Arts industries are instead finding gentrified areas where displacement of poorer individuals has already occurred, and they are building new bases in those neighborhoods.

Article source: Grodach, Carl, Nicole Foster, and James Murdoch, “Gentrification, Displacement and the Arts: Untangling the Relationship Between Arts Industries and Place Change,” Urban Studies 55, no. 4 (2016): 807-825.

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