CINCINNATI — Tony Lipps cleans his paintbrush. He squirts it down with a water bottle and scrapes it on the table. He’s standing in the shower.
So, what used to be a shower.
Lipps’ art studio is part of a co-working space in the old Queensgate Prison. He knows it used to be a shower because he worked there as a correctional officer for two years.
“When I found out it was the prison, I had to check it out,” Lipps said of the studio.
Lipps has been making art since he was three years old. He would pick up comic books and try to imitate the images. He didn’t really read them. He even went to college to study art, but he graduated and became a police officer.
That is the reality of life.
“The hardest thing is jumping,” said Lipps. “Making that jump.”
It took 13 years before he gave up his job as a police officer and devoted himself entirely to painting.
“It’s not easy,” he said.
Such a development is not easy in Queensgate. Outside Lipps’ studio, you don’t hear birds. You hear trains.
But Lipps said the vision for LinnCinnati and the surrounding community won him over.
“What excites me about this development is that it really shows that change is possible,” said Brian Boland, an urban planner. “Old places that were once considered forgotten can be brought back to life in new ways.”
Queensgate was once part of the West End and was described as an industrial wasteland. It is one of the few neighborhoods in Cincinnati that does not have a city council, because hardly anyone lives there.
Decades ago, authorities demolished thousands of homes and businesses there to make way for Interstate 75. LinnCinnati officials tell us this project could be the first domino to fall toward a better future for the neighborhood.
“We hope we inspire many people to look at Queensgate differently,” said Alek Lucke, construction representative for LinnCinnati.
Keith BieryGolick
On Monday, Lipps walks through the facility where he used to carry a sketchbook. He says he didn’t particularly like his work.
“I was drawing,” he said. “That’s how I passed the time.”
More than a decade later, he looks out the window at the parking lot of his truck, which is parked in the former rest area.
“It’s crazy,” he said. “I remember it clearly.”
