It is in fact a corporate entity, partnering with another corporate entity, True North Studio, for the Phoenix project. In their 2018 documentary Meow Wolf: Origin Story, the collective refers to themselves in one instance as “Santa Fe’s orphans of neglect,” which can be viewed as insensitive if not ignorant to what brown people working in contemporary art in Santa Fe go through to show their work that may not fit into the establishment of Canyon Road art galleries. The problem with Meow Wolf is that it is a supreme act of late stage capitalism disguised through the collective’s mantra of the underdog as art savior. There are already fewer galleries on Roosevelt Row than a few years ago, and along Central Avenue in midtown Phoenix, a new multistory, hipster-vibe apartment building goes up every other month. A Meow Wolf Hotel just seems part of the larger gentrification that is displacing people with lower incomes to find shelter and studio space elsewhere. In an article published in AZ Central last year, artists are quoted as speaking out against the rapid development of the neighborhood. While it is admirable that a group of artists has been able to be so monetarily successful - Meow Wolf also plans to expand to Las Vegas, Denver, and Washington DC - we have to ask: What is it doing for culture as a whole? I cannot speak for Las Vegas, Denver, DC, or even really Santa Fe, but for Phoenix, it is worrisome. It could dislodge local artists from their downtown and south Phoenix studios as more and more development happens on that scale in the “arts district,” raising prices, making it difficult for small galleries to exist, DIY spaces, and the like. So what does a Meow Wolf hotel mean for Phoenix? CEO Vince Kadlubeck shared in a statement on the Meow Wolf website, “Guests are always asking about staying overnight inside of our House of Eternal Return project in Santa Fe, so doing an intertwined exhibition and hotel just made sense to us.” The decision feels more driven by customer service than a curatorial vision. Meow Wolf has also adopted a hotel model that feels populist. This narrative, transplanted into a brown neighborhood in a city that is defined, predicated on, and commodified around Indigenous identity, can be read as tone-deaf at a moment in this country when decolonial narratives are prominent. Some, myself included, have been critical of the vaguely colonial subtext that underlies its permanent installation titled the House of Eternal Return. The interactive, two-story Victorian house is centered on the imagined story of a white family from California. However, Meow Wolf has not been loved by all in that community. The psychedelic, Burning Man-esque vibe of the Santa Fe flagship Meow Wolf has been widely popular, seeing large attendance numbers for the small southwest mountain town.
PHOENIX - It was announced the weekend of February 23 that the Santa Fe-based collective Meow Wolf would be opening a 400-room art-themed hotel in Downtown Phoenix, complete with a 75,000-square-foot exhibition space, in the middle of Roosevelt Row Arts District. Meow Wolf in Santa Fe (photo by Hrag Vartanian/Hyperallergic)
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