The streets are empty — not a person in sight. Only empty buses and the occasional police car roll down the silent streets.
This is the downtown Phoenix that local artist Travis Fields remembers from his youth.
“Literally the old saying, ‘They roll up the streets at night,’” he said. “That’s how it was downtown.”
Phoenix muralist Hugo Medina feels much the same way.
“The city was built and was pretty much a ghost town until the artists started coming in,” Medina said. “Artists are giving the city a heart and soul.”
Today, Fields said he sees the city much differently.
“We’re finally getting something happening downtown,” he said, using “we” to refer to him and the other artists that he banded together with. “There’s this whole revitalization that’s going on.”
After a lengthy career in graphic design, Fields recently decided to venture back into the fine arts. As he looked into doing that, he realized there was little in the way of artist centrality in the area.
“There were artists — a lot of good artists — but they were really scattered about,” he said.
Having a business background after working at an art supply store as well as being an art director of a contemporary art gallery in Scottsdale gave Fields a unique perspective on this issue.
“A lot of artists are good at paintings but a lot of artists are not so good at the business side of it,” he said. “And that’s when I realized I can help all these artists.”
Fields founded a Facebook group called Arizona Artists in April of this year. It just recently passed the 1,000-member mark.
“I post a lot of stuff that’s relevant to artists,” Fields said. This includes everything from tax information to articles on the effects of the new health care law. The group also meets monthly.
Medina works with Fields on the Facebook page and said he was impressed by how much Fields accomplished.
“He does a great job keeping everybody informed and getting everybody to the meetings,” Medina said.
“I usually have a couple different speakers,” Fields said. “We try to do them around town because we’ve got people that live (from) east Mesa to west Valley.”
Local artist Jayme Blue also helps Fields manage the group.
“Travis is a machine,” Blue said. “I don’t know anyone who would dream of taking on such an enormous and difficult task as trying to round up a bunch of free spirits and non-conformists to create a united front representing contemporary art.”
In founding the group, Fields ended up furthering his own career, too.
“I’ve met all kinds of gallery owners that I probably wouldn’t have met before,” he said. “It still accomplished one of my goals while starting something that I think is really exciting.”
And Fields is still creating as he manages his group of artists.
“For me it’s almost a spiritual experience,” he said. “When I create something I feel connected, there’s an energy there.”
Most of Fields’ works of art are abstract paintings with acrylic paint, but he recently took up photography.
“I really like the immediacy of it,” he said. “I like the fact that I can go out someplace, take a thousand pictures, come back, sort through them, find the ones I like the best and it costs almost nothing.”
Cost is something that Fields also took into consideration when he founded his group of artists. His monthly meetings are free and he hopes to keep it that way. He said that, unfortunately, there’s a lot of truth to the starving artist stereotype.
“We just try to help out as much as we can,” he said.
But the money aspect of art never drove Fields away.
“If you want this lifestyle maybe you’re not going to have that Lexus,” he said. “But often artists can live with less.”
And Fields’ family supported this belief every step of the way. Fields has two daughters that also share his passion for art.
“It’s kind of a special thing I have with them,” he said. “And there’s a lot of creative people in my family, too.”
Fields said that a lot of the time, people who are not supportive of art just don’t see any structure or career possibilities behind it.
“There’s so much you can do with art,” he said.
Now, Fields hopes that he and his group of artists can help propel the art movement forward. He dreams of a thriving art community centered in a big city.
“There’s so much potential,” he said. Blue agreed.
“The timing is great,” Blue said. “We all need to pitch in to raise the bar to get Phoenix on the map of the contemporary art world.”
If Fields has his way, the streets of downtown Phoenix will never be quiet again. He hopes for hoards of people walking from artwork to artwork, cars squished into crammed gallery parking lots and sneaky muralists painting decaying buildings.
“It’s just a matter of two or three more years,” he said. “I’m excited to be a part of it.”
Contact the reporter at Emma.Totten@asu.edu
