Gentrification is a development that has fundamentally changed our cities worldwide - their appearance, their organisation, their lifestyle and their purpose. With prices skyrocketing and residents as well as local businesses being displaced from the central neighbourhoods modern cities do not provide space for lived community and citizenship anymore, but for tourism and big companies to increase profits and sales markets.

However, gentrification also tells us a lot about our capacity to deal with change and transience in general. It touches a sense of security and stability within us that struggles to give up a way of living that we have become used to especially when we liked the way it was. How do we face this challenge in a world that’s so rapidly changing in all regards?

When I shot this short film in New York City in 2017, I was interested in the individual stories of people that have been personally impacted by the extreme gentrification processes in Manhattan. I wanted to know how they emotionally deal with a changing cityscape that has not only been their home for the past twenty to thirty years but has deeply shaped their personality, work environment, sexuality, sense of community and political engagement. This is not a nostalgic glimpse into the past, when everything was better, but an inspiration on how we can learn from a time that didn’t revolve around materialistic values, that offered a home for people from all walks of life without over-regulating their way of living.

Because, ultimately gentrification also always raises the question of how we want to live together in an urban environment. How do we want to build and co-create cities that serve our fundamental needs as well as our longing for community, connection and a meaningful life? How can we shape cities so that they are not relicts of a rich history but lived realities, alive and vivid, always reinventing themselves.

Metamorphosis was created as a cooperation with the New School New York City.