FELLOW SPOTLIGHT: AMI BENNITT
AMI BENNITT
Founding Volunteer Member of #ARTSTAYSHERE Coalition
Region: City of Boston
(Picture features Ami Bennitt on the left, Jean Mineo on the right)
The 2023-2024 Advocacy and Organizing Fellowship cohort are a collective of arts and culture leaders, practitioners, and activists from distinct communities within Massachusetts. While they spend the year incubating and implementing plans to address the unique needs of local or statewide creative communities, MASSCreative is proud to share their reflections on their projects and learnings.
This reflection is offered by Advocacy and Organizing Fellow Ami Bennitt. Ami is a founding member of the #ARTSTAYSHERE Coalition, a volunteer-led effort by artists, musicians, and advocates working to prevent arts and cultural displacement throughout Greater Boston. They are leading a movement where the arts and artists are valued as necessary assets to cities, towns, neighborhoods, and overall wellbeing.
AMI’S REFLECTION
My name is Ami Bennitt and I am a fellow in MASSCreative’s Advocacy and Organizing Fellowship. My fellowship project is #ARTSTAYSHERE, an all-volunteer nonprofit committed to preventing arts, music, and cultural displacement, and creating more spaces for artists to work and create.
#ARTSTAYSHERE has three lines of advocacy work:
Boots on the ground organizing of arts and music workspace buildings; helping those at risk to preserve their space, or relocate, if necessary;
Developing an “arts space advocacy army” of stakeholders and supporters to raise visibility for the cause, speak out to elected officials, and amplify the value of artists in communities;
Developing longer-term policies and protections for affordable arts workspaces.
#ARTSTAYSHERE directly addresses the needs of the Massachusetts creative sector, serving as the only advocacy group focused solely on affordable, long-term creative space. Our coalition:
Helped Humphreys Street Studios (Dorchester) become majority artist-owned and operated as affordable arts workspaces in perpetuity;
Helped find interim music rehearsal space for hundreds displaced from Brighton’s Sound Museum, plus encourage the developer to donate an $18M building in Brighton earmarked for affordable, long-term music rehearsal;
Helped the 700+ musicians at Charlestown Rehearsal Studios to work with their landlords and the City to keep music rehearsal on their site;
And helped get relocation support for the artists being displaced from 119 Braintree Street (Allston).
(Artists from Vernon Street Studios (Somerville) and Sherman Street (Charlestown) participate at #ARTSTAYSHERE’s on-site advocacy meeting in Somerville on February 12. Second picture features City Councilor At-Large Jake Wilson (left), making Don’t F with FAB! buttons with Humphreys Street Studios artist Franklin Marval)
Currently, we’re leading a citywide advocacy campaign across Somerville, called Don’t F with FAB!, educating the public about arts displacement and how to uphold Somerville’s 2019 creation of the Fabrication District supporting ACE (arts and creative enterprise) uses.
Long term, we aim to become a fully funded agency that will provide the advocacy outlined above, as well as create more protected affordable, long-term arts workspace for our sector.
I’m so glad to be part of the Fellowship cohort because advocacy work is often all-consuming and siloed. Advocacy doesn’t sleep. So joining with MASSCreative and the fellows helps gain perspective on organizing, that it's a special kind of work, and it’s constant. I have also enjoyed working among the other advocates and learning about their projects across Massachusetts.
MASSCreative has curated a great menu of advocacy and organizing professional development sessions. The consultants are experts in their respective fields who are ready to share their knowledge and best practices. I look forward to continuing to learn in community with my fellow organizers and seeing everyone’s projects evolve over 2024.
