I Was Told There Would Be No Math

An Artist-led Conversation About the Inextricable Link Among Economics, Culture, and Place

Huáscar Robles, 2023 GIA Conference Blog

What does it take to build a grand dream? A space for the promulgation of freedom, a place for cultural innovation, a place that recognizes the past while it designs the future? The answer is simple: imagination. This was the maxim at the heart of “I Was Told There Would Be No Math,” a session that dealt marginally with numbers and more with powerful and instinctive visioning. 

Presented by Cate Fox of AmbitioUS, the lecture flowed like a writing prompt in which Anasa Troutman and Nkuli Shongwe encouraged participants to use speculative fiction to envision an equitable future: Troutman through Olivia Butler’s Parable of the Sower and Nkuli through Butler’s Parable of Talents. 

“When thinking about community wealth building, it’s going to take more than one effort to get there; it’s going to take cooperative work to move space, time, and resources to figure out what the next big thing is.”

Shongwe, from the Nexus Community Partners in the Twin Cities, shared that, through cooperatives, she has witnessed the potential for equitable futures. The North Star Black Cooperative, for example, has developed wellness in communities where members congregate, strategize and take action. “When thinking about community wealth building, it’s going to take more than one effort to get there; it’s going to take cooperative work to move space, time, and resources to figure out what the next big thing is. I am so excited for what is coming next.”

Troutman saw the future in a vision. She witnessed the potential of the Historic Clayborn Temple (HCT) not as it stood before her when she visited the dilapidated building in Memphis but when she connected with the place at a visceral level. “My brain exploded. Have you ever had a moment when you walk into a place and say, ‘I belong here?’ All these things are happening to your body and your mind, and you’re like, ‘I don’t know who you are, but we belong together.’”

The journey to acquisition was not without obstacles. She first produced a musical for the property’s owners, who had no experience in music or producing. Union: The Musical was an accidental byproduct of the initial dream of attaining the HCT, proving that sometimes opportunities come in unexpected forms. The Union musical showcased the story of the sanitation workers’ strike of 1968 and Martin Luther King’s last campaign, but it didn’t immediately lead to taking over the HCT. Troutman, however, could not be deterred. That building, she insisted, belongs to the community. 

Troutman contextualized Memphis in its history of land ownership. Memphis was the home of Robert Church, one of the country’s first Black millionaires who created spaces for Black communities when there were none. His legacy was bulldozed when his son’s partner sold the church’s land to the federal government, and it became the second largest public housing in the country, Troutman said.  

Troutman spent a year raising money, digging into real estate development, and overall becoming “her own philanthropist.” She’s currently in the middle of a $30 million transformation of the HCT, which is flourishing into a cultural, entrepreneurship, and real estate incubator. 

“Wealth is built through land ownership and entrepreneurship,” she emphasized. And, as she pointed out in her opening phrases, it all began with a dream. “It’s the power of storytelling. You have to envision your future. You can’t separate imagination from real estate and economics.”