The Roots of Artist Housing in Newark J

ames Baldwin said, “The precise role of the artist … [is] to make the world a more human dwelling place.” As Newark moves forward, it is the goal of the city administrators to assure that our creative community will firmly be supported and entrenched in our neighborhoods, in Newark’s economic growth, and in helping the city become Baldwin’s more human dwelling place for our artists.

Certainly one step forward in this aim is to assist in the development of affordable and accommodating living spaces for artists in any of Newark’s neighborhoods. Assuring live/work spaces for Newark artists is not a new concept. Even in the days when local residents opened their homes as performance spaces, like Amiri and Amina Baraka’s Kimako’s Blues People, Mrs. Elma Bateman’s home, or Ms. Louise Scott’s mansion, the creative community knew Newark as a place where interactive expressive juices could flow to a warm and receptive local and international community.

Today that expressive, imaginative creativity continues and we see new real estate developments opening with the artist community in mind.

—Gwen Moten