Creative Mornings crowd brings energy to Town Hall
The Woodruff Place Town Hall saw a packed house on the morning of April 21st as part of a worldwide Creative Mornings event series. Creative Mornings organizers designate a monthly theme that is explored in 170 cities throughout the world. Participants enjoy fresh coffee and friendly people while highlighting a city’s creative talent, but also promoting an open space to connect with like-minded individuals.
Mat Davis and Woodruff Place resident, Meredith Brickell, were the featured speakers of the April 21st gathering. Having worked together through the House Life Project, a grassroots, arts-focused initiative based in an abandoned house on the Near Eastside of Indianapolis, Davis and Brickell explored ideas around suburban and urban living, artists’ role in community revitalization and the concept of ‘place’. “Artists act as a monitor to test the temperature of the housing market” said Davis, who has been a leader of several community-based arts initiative in Indianapolis. As these initiatives grew and attracted new types of people to the neighborhood, changes in the desirability of the real estate followed.
Davis and Brickell skillfully and humorously wove their diverse personal experiences living and working in different environments into an evolving story about preferred lifestyle environments throughout recent history in the United States that have shifted from urban, to suburban and circling back again. “Gentrification and displacement get lumped together but they’re not exactly the same thing” said Davis. The exploration of this topic at an event in Woodruff Place was especially interesting given the housing revitalization that is quickly taking hold in many of the surrounding neighborhoods. To learn more about the Creative Mornings series, visit https://creativemornings.com/cities/ind