Given Josh Kline’s new essay, is anyone actually rethinking NYC?
I’m a Philadelphian who’s been in NYC for the past two years in an MFA program. As I finish up, I’m probably going to head back. I just can’t afford New York, at least not in a way where I can have the time and resources to pursue my practice. Whenever I tell this to my mentors or NY artists in general, they encourage me to stay. But the Kline essay in October has articulated perfectly everything I’ve tried to explain to them. With that in mind, what would you need to happen to make a go of it in a city like Philly? Partially because that’s my home and partly because it’s the city Kline mentioned, but what would you need to happen there or in any other cheaper secondary city to make it attractive?
Edit: To clarify, I’m not asking if yall think I should go back to Philadelphia. I’m asking, as somebody who is and is interested in working to build up and support my community, what that kind of infrastructure would need to look like in order to be a viable alternative. Feel free to give me something pragmatic or something fantastical. Even shoot me down if you can explain why you think it can’t work and what is lacking. But the essay, as I read it, was a challenge to image a new way, and I’m interested in picking the collective hive mind.