Abstract painter Sarah Wieben spends more than eight hours every day in her studio, brush in hand.
But that’s not where her workday ends. She works part time as an instructor at Minneapolis College of Art and Design and also has to buy art supplies, maintain her website and update her social media accounts. Anything she earns has to first go toward paying for her work and living space.
“Basically, an artist has two rents: your home and then your studio. That’s a lot more than what most people have in bills,” she said. “Then a lot of us still have student debt, and as an artist, it is hard to ever surmount it.”
But Wieben has her eye on a new development next door to her studio in the Northrup King Building in northeast Minneapolis that could lower costs for her and other artists. Nonprofit Artspace is building affordable housing for qualifying tenants, giving priority to artists. Construction on these artists’ lofts started in late October and in about 18 months there will be 84 units to fill buildings that have been vacant since the 1980s.
Were Wieben to snag one of those apartments, it would shorten her commute and her monthly bills.
“It’s nearly impossible to find affordable living spaces for an artist to live in,” she said. “To be able to maintain an art practice, you need some help, some relief from somewhere. I think Artspace provides that and that they’ve been a really good steward of the arts, and not just here but around the country.”
Artspace formed as a nonprofit real estate organization in 1986 to create, foster and preserve affordable space for artists and art organizations, according to its website. Today, its portfolio includes 59 properties in operation, 10 in development and 48 open to new leases.
In Minnesota, the organization has 24 residential and commercial properties. While the bulk is in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Artspace also has buildings in Hastings, Brainerd, Fergus Falls and Duluth. Out-of-state properties are in locales like Colorado, Washington, Illinois, New York and Washington, D.C.