Arts Power 50: The Changemakers Shaping the Art World in 2019

by Paddy Johnson

It isn’t easy to make ends meet in San Francisco. According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, minimum wage workers need to work 4.7 full-time jobs to afford a two-bedroom unit in the San Francisco Bay Area.

It’s within this context that the Minnesota Street Project emerged—a unique business model founded and run by Deborah and Andy Rappaport that uses their for-profit art storage facility to subsidize economically sustainable spaces for art galleries, artists and related nonprofits. They have almost single-handedly created a sustainable environment where an arts community can thrive.

The program hosts bigger names such as the McEvoy Foundation, Altman Seigel gallery, and Adrian Rosenfeld Gallery, and it provides residency programs and affordable studio space for rising art stars like Sarah Kerr, Dana Hemenway and Chris Sollars.

Seeking to build on their already successful model, the Rappaports are currently working on a new initiative that will put even more art professionals in touch with their tenants.

“We are very excited about a program we are developing to bring the arts communities of other cultures and cities to San Francisco,” they told Observer. The program will run by extending invitations to a lead gallery that, in turn, invites several others. The resulting platform should include a series of events that will include food, performances and lectures.