Aida Wilde at work

So what did happen in Hackney Wick over the May Day bank holiday? I like Aida Wilde, I like the positive anger, the constructive energy, the wit, I like her colour, her words, I like Aida Wilde’s style and I like her art  And as with a lot of us London-based artists right now, a lot of her art is about survival, about just being able to exist, to exist in a creative state.

Right now Aida and the Hackney Wick artists are fighting for their homes, their studios, their creative space (we all are actually)  “I for one, will not sit back and inevitably lose my home, studio and community”.. Vyner Street was the front line, we lost that (without much of a fight),  Hackney Wick is going, we’re all having to go, London is no longer a place for real working artists, creativity and community is not something that’s valued.   Did we bring it on ourselves? This really was a no-go area back in the day, the place really was the wild west, you really sisn;t like ot be around here after dark until the artists grabbed hold of it, pulled it back, stitched the buildings back together, saved the old factories, created communities, created spaces people wanted to come to, creative areas people wanted to live in, the estate agents love us artist types, they use us in their glossy sales brochures, come live with the artists and the galleries, only they’ve priced us all out and knocked our spaces down and made it very clear we are not wanted around here anymore….

So last Monday, Aida Wilde had another dig, it was her fault after all, she did cause the gentrification, so her prints went up in the wall (again), no hashtag this time,  her pieces didn’t last long, we didn’t expect them to, gone by the next day and soon all the artists will be gone…

We kinda have them when it comes to the work we create but not when we congregate in down trodden areas that no one wants to live in and not a soul on the streets past 6pm…..It’s all the familiar cliche stories you hear about Shoreditch, Hackney, Walthemstow et al…. The fact that creatives have contributed to the growth, culture, aesthetics, kudos and it’s economy is always overlooked by the councils who are reaping it’s benefits but giving nothing back once all the developers have moved in & chucked all the loyal struggling/non struggling creatives who have contributed to it’s rise… read on via Aida’s blog