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In February, several prominent art galleries near San Francisco’s Union Square were evicted to make space for a neighboring software company’s impending expansion. The events reflected a troubling consequence of the city’s recent tech boom: as property values and costs of living continue to climb in San Francisco, many artists are finding the city to be an increasingly difficult place for them to live, work and create.
Feyboy, a grassroots queer artist collective, provides another example of the emigration of artists out of San Francisco. Under the leadership of organizer Zac Benfield, several members of the collective recently moved from San Francisco into a new compound near Oakland’s City Center. In early March, they hosted their first event at the compound, an after party following Oakland’s First Friday Art Murmur, in celebration of new beginnings and to see what kind of community they would find in their new city.
