EAST AUSTIN STUDIO TOUR 2007

Comic book is tongue-in-cheek response to East Austin gentrification

Artist Michael Schliefke's original storyboards will be featured at Bolm Studio, headquarters for the now-annual studio tour.

By Jeanne Claire van Ryzin
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Thursday, November 15, 2007

Gentrification is a paradox all around. Artists looking for affordable space move into marginalized, overlooked neighborhoods. Next come a handful of trendy coffee shops, a few galleries, then the chic residential development. The neighborhood's original population — typically economically disadvantaged communities — gets pushed out. And next, so do the artists. And the artists get mad.

It's happening to East Austin. And artist Michael Schliefke — a six-year resident of East Austin — admits his culpability in the transformation of the neighborhood's shift from historically a Latino and African American community to a trendy, loft-filled offshoot of Austin's booming downtown.

Schliefke's response: Make snide jokes. Or specifically, pen "Tales of the Really White Vigilante," a comic book that's a tongue-in-cheek valentine of sorts to the change he sees all around him. In Schliefke's tale, a young white man transforms into a lucha libre-like superhero to combat gentrification in East Austin. There's plenty of irony in the superhero's misguided adventures (he builds a wall around East Austin and charges admission). And Schliefke, a transplanted East Coaster and graduate of the Kansas City Art Institute, is well aware of the inherent contradiction of his efforts.

"I'm not trying to speak for others because I wouldn't want people speaking for me," he says.

This week's release of "Tales" is timed to this weekend's East Austin Studio Tour, the annual event that finds artists opening their studios and homes to the public for a two-day "come all ye" viewing. Schliefke's studio on Bolm Road (part of the Bolm Studios complex which is the tour's headquarters) will feature his original storyboards for the black-and-white comic as well his own figurative paintings. Schliefke will sell the book at the tour and on his Web site, www.schliefkevision.com.

Adding to the whole paradox that "Tales" references, the very success of the studio tour is part of the reason that East Austin's popularity as a trendy, destination neighborhood has grown.

Started in 2003 by artists Shea Little, Joseph Phillips and Jana Swec (the three are also the art-producing collective known as Sodalitas), the event has grown from featuring about 30 artists at an equal number of locations to more than 100 studios that together feature more 200 artists.

Interestingly, demand to be a part of the tour has not only resulted in artists from other parts of town staking out space with their East Austin friends, but it also led tour organizers to carefully define — for their purposes —just where East Austin begins and ends. (Sorry, just being east of Interstate 35 doesn't get you into the tour.)

Still, Schliefke maintains that his ironic riff is not about real vigilantism. "I'm really just hoping this will just spark discussion," says Schliefke of his comic book.

"I'm not sure if the issue has really been dealt with by many people, particularly those who are taking part in it. We need to acknowledge what we're losing and how we're going to deal with it."

jvanryzin@statesman.com; 445-3699