The Big Picture : After a Decade of Decline Brought on by the Recession, the Downtown Artists Development Assn. Is Working to Revitalize the Once-Thriving Art Scene.

I moved Downtown when I was 30, in 1975. At that time there were almost no artists living Downtown. There were only two or three studios. A friend of mine had moved into one of them when I was graduating from art school and I liked it, so I found one for myself.

I moved into what had been a commercial garment manufacturing space in Little Tokyo. It was empty when I moved in. I paid $75 a month for 2,500 square feet.

At first, my studio was pretty raw. A lot of my friends came down to see it and thought I was absolutely crazy to move into it. It was a big, empty, very dirty warehouse. All it had really was a toilet, but I did a lot of work to make it livable. It ended up being a very beautiful space.

From 1975 to 1980, a lot of artists moved into very similar spaces all over Downtown. There were a lot on Broadway, there were artists’ lofts that stretched from the Santa Monica Freeway to Chinatown to the Los Angeles River. Lots of artists were attracted by the big spaces and the cheap rents.

At the very beginning, when everybody first started moving in, there would be two or three new studios opening every week. People would throw potluck dinners and they’d get everybody together.

There were a lot of galleries that opened in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. Most of them have left now, but a lot of new ones have taken their place. The galleries came in along with the artists, taking advantage of spaces and low rents.

When LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions) came, that became a center for artists to gather. Of course there were also lots of galleries and shows to go to.

Gorky’s came in 1982. It was not really part of the original early art scene. It was a nice place, but the places that people ate at regularly are the ethnic restaurants, places in Little Tokyo and Chinatown.

During the 1980s, the artist district leveled off. A lot of the galleries that were here in the early ‘80s left. Most could not survive for economic reasons.

Over the years, a lot of people have said that the Downtown art scene was dead. Well, it’s not dead. Last year, we formed DADA to encompass art, music, performance art, poetry, all the arts. We have 280 members.

One of the first things we did was to take a survey of artists living Downtown. Our best estimate is that there are about 1,800 studio spaces down here. From 1975 (when there were no studios) to 1990 (with 1,800) there was impressive growth.

Living down here now, I get the same feeling I had when I first moved here in 1975. There are a lot of spaces available because of the recession. Prices have come down and landlords are more willing to work with people to make things happen.

I hope maybe some galleries will come down here and open again and take advantage of the fact that there are still a lot of artists here.

Last year, DADA held a huge art show in conjunction with the Los Angeles Art Fair. We had 400 artists in the show, and 4,000 people were there on opening night.

I have a vision for what I think the Downtown artist district could really be like. I hope it will be a thriving art community, with galleries and restaurants.

That almost happened in the ‘70s. If we’d had a little bit of help from the city at that time it could have happened.