Artists Transform Moran Street

**Pam** · December-28-10, 06:47 AM

http://www.freep.com/article/2010122...eet-in-Detroit

Backed by $180,000 raised by San Francisco art magazine Juxtapoz, six out-of-state artists spent the fall transforming four houses on Moran Street, south of Davison, into edgy masterpieces.

Anyone familiar with this? It wasn't clear if people are going to be living in all these houses or not.

**rajdet** · December-28-10, 07:27 AM

http://www.powerhouseproject.com/ind...oz-in-detroit/

**Django** · December-28-10, 07:34 AM

This isn't on Moran and Farnsworth? I know Graem White lives near that block and its full of out of town artists. Hes listed on the second link. I know of an art house, or building rather thats on Farnsworth and Moran. I cant remember what they named it though.

**Fury13** · December-28-10, 11:28 AM

Django, if there is something going on like that on Moran near Farnsworth, I'd be interested in knowing about it. My dad was born on that block.

**Detroitnerd** · December-28-10, 11:37 AM

Nah, you're thinking of Yes Farm on Farnsworth at Moran and west. This is north of Hamtramck.

**Lt. Dan Bassett** · December-28-10, 01:29 PM

Wake up, Detroit. Hah! The imports are back to eat your lunch!

The 4 houses of which they speak in the FP are not habitable ATM -- may never be. Think of this as an evolving urban-art amusement park or a growing pile of junk if you think street art/lowbrow is bunk. [[Does bunk = $180,000 being throw over here to the midwest because a gaggle of lowbrow-art all stars donated work to be auctioned a year ago October to celebrate the 15-year anniversary of an art/culture mag in SF?)
Academia apparently does not get to decide what's "good" art anymore.
The so-called "Swoon house" is burned out in the roof at the back and a big-ass triangle has been cut out of the main ground floor room. You can see Callie Curry's [[Swoon, NY) pasteups in the basement from above. There's more on the ground floor. At the back of this house is a stack of disembodied dormers and a charred pediment -- parts amputated or lifted from empty/burned out homes around Chene on the east side. This is the work of Ben Wolf [[NY).
The house next door, going south, is a mix of UM architecture school experiment and gentle imagery by one of the Juxtapoz mag imports, S. Oh from Oakland, CA. Mostly these structures are 3D canvases for lowbrow/street art elites from elsewhere with some bankrolled [[cough) pioneering spirit. Across the street from these are two more artified houses. Richard Colman [[SF) and Retna [[LA i think) worked the walls of the insides of one with silver and white paint -- a cool bit of calligraphic "brimstone" from Retna inside and out.
To the left of this house is one with accessories inside and out. Found objects, mostly collected from the eastside of Detroit by Monica Canilao [[SF), will make you say, "holy crap, look at that place!"
When I was walking up there early one morning in October a scrapper in an old Dodge truck was picking through a pile of collected material as if it was a metal recycling station.
My guess is, like it or no, Moran Street, up near the Davison, has potential to become an art fag destination like Heidelberg Street.
If you find yourself singing these "ways are strange to us, they're dangerous" you can get up to speed on the culture a bit by finding a way to view the recently released Banksy film "Exit Through the Gift Shop."

**Pam** · December-28-10, 01:54 PM

an art fag

Was that really necessary? Thanks for the info. up to that point.

**Detroitnerd** · December-28-10, 02:06 PM

Originally Posted by Pam

Was that really necessary? Thanks for the info. up to that point.

Pam, art fag is what art fags call each other.

**Lt. Dan Bassett** · December-28-10, 03:37 PM

DNerd is hipsteroidially correctotory.

Art fag is a term of endearment.
No offense is intended.
Just like when I read motownreviewofart.blogspot.com I read it as motownreview-o-fart, just for fun. BTW everyone should read this guy Carducci's blog if you have an art passion in Detroit. Maybe this'll prod him to post more often.

**boogiechillen** · December-28-10, 07:15 PM

Originally Posted by Lt. Dan Bassett

Wake up, Detroit. Hah! The imports are back to eat your lunch!

Think of this as an evolving urban-art amusement park or a growing pile of junk if you think street art/lowbrow is bunk. [[Does bunk = $180,000 being throw over here to the midwest because a gaggle of lowbrow-art all stars donated work to be auctioned a year ago October to celebrate the 15-year anniversary of an art/culture mag in SF?)

Lt. Dan, I can appreciate your cynicism.

Usually, when someone self-indulgently paints an abandoned building, their work is derided as graffiti. I guess if you are from New York or San Francisco and backed by serious dollars, then you can call yourself an artist when you paint on an abandoned building.

Couldn't that money have been used in a better way? The sites on which those houses sit will remain brown fields for some time to come. With the time, energy and money expended on this project, how many homes in that neighborhood could have been rehabbed? Though I'm glad those artists enjoyed a nice little vacation in Detroit painting on our blank canvas of a city to the tune of $180,000, I would have been more edified to see that money given to Detroiters to build or maintain a useful structure.

**Django** · December-28-10, 08:07 PM

Juxtapoz is an art magazine not a development company, why would you care if the come in to the D and do something creative with whats to offer here, Thats what art collectives and companies do. The idea of public art is to make a city more interactive, diverse, interesting.

and from this quote it sounds like they are doing some rehab.

The Power House is at the corner of Moran and Lawley. Cope and visiting artists are renovating the house to be totally energy self-sufficient and off the grid. Cope provides electricity to the home through a generator powered by a rooftop wind turbine. A Dutch artist, Erik Jutten, whose stay is funded by a grant from a Netherlands foundation, recut the roof to install windows and solar panels to heat the home. Cope is scrounging up recycled refrigerator doors to fashion a water collection system.

You can call me an art fag.

"

**eno** · December-28-10, 10:59 PM

Django, thanks for the clarity without the negativity.

**Pam** · December-29-10, 07:22 AM

The Power House is at the corner of Moran and Lawley. Cope and visiting artists are renovating the house to be totally energy self-sufficient and off the grid. Cope provides electricity to the home through a generator powered by a rooftop wind turbine. A Dutch artist, Erik Jutten, whose stay is funded by a grant from a Netherlands foundation, recut the roof to install windows and solar panels to heat the home. Cope is scrounging up recycled refrigerator doors to fashion a water collection system.

I liked that idea.

**Frumoasa** · December-29-10, 10:32 AM

This is very close to my house and although I am not a fan of all the structures...there is some unique stuff going on up there. The Power House is an amazing idea and Detroit is one of the few places where an idea like this could actually come to fruition. My only issue with the article is that Caniff and the Davison do not intersect. I think they mean Conant...

**Lt. Dan Bassett** · December-29-10, 01:21 PM

Originally Posted by Frumoasa

This is very close to my house and although I am not a fan of all the structures...there is some unique stuff going on up there. The Power House is an amazing idea and Detroit is one of the few places where an idea like this could actually come to fruition. My only issue with the article is that Caniff and the Davison do not intersect. I think they mean Conant...

Indeed. Errors of attribution in online photo gallery hurt FP credibility too.
It'll be interesting to see how the Feb. issue of Jux mag showcases Moran St. If their semi-live online blog about it is any indication, [[save the Seelie photos) it'll suck. Hope they put a good writer on it.
All I learned @ "Jux in Detroit" is what imports ate for breakfast and lunch and what time they got up in the afternoon to go play in the street all night. More like a 12-year-old girl's daily diary it was. But again, the Tod Seelie photo documentation is very good.

**1KielsonDrive** · December-29-10, 02:46 PM

So, I've been an 'Art Fag' all of these years? I've been called a 'Fag' before, but never endearingly. I guess I have to step up my game.

**Lt. Dan Bassett** · December-29-10, 04:46 PM

Originally Posted by 1KielsonDrive

So, I've been an 'Art Fag' all of these years? I've been called a 'Fag' before, but never endearingly. I guess I have to step up my game.

yes, art fags too, can be blissfully happy. gender reassignment is not the new black.

**Relayer76** · December-29-10, 08:07 PM

Art, is that what that is called? $180,000 could have been spent to bring 5 or 6 houses up to liveable standards for people in need. This is elitist B.S. that will not have any positive long term effect.

**warsaw7** · December-30-10, 12:32 AM

Originally Posted by Relayer76

Art, is that what that is called? $180,000 could have been spent to bring 5 or 6 houses up to liveable standards for people in need. This is elitist B.S. that will not have any positive long term effect.

Seriously can you please get out of the pool now..........

**RickBeall** · December-30-10, 12:38 AM

Stuff like this attracts attention and maybe even some artists who will come and live and create here.

In Detroit, for the usual cost of art supplies, paint and canvas, you can buy an entire house to use as your canvas. You can build in 3D where the component parts already have meaning and some contraversey. Can you have great art without contraversey?

In music, we sample songs, in art we build from pre-existing pieces. Is this a blip or a permanent trend, a foreshadow of the all encompassing future?

[[And Lt. Dan Bassett I greatly respect your comments because you have obviously researched, investigated and thought about this topic!)

**Django** · December-30-10, 03:32 AM

Originally Posted by Relayer76

Art, is that what that is called? $180,000 could have been spent to bring 5 or 6 houses up to liveable standards for people in need. This is elitist B.S. that will not have any positive long term effect.

Detroit has Im sure many thousands of livable homes waiting to be rented out or sold. The art project idea is to prime the pump here in Detroit so ppl will see it as an artists kind of place to live. Remember how Greenwich Village once was, until all the hip young creative kids moved into the cheap run down area with dreams of making it better? I wonder what a Brownstone there goes for now. If 20 creative young'uns saw this project and decided to move here how much money would that bring into the city in a year, Id bet well over $180,000. Then again we could rehab five houses in this housing market.

**Lt. Dan Bassett** · December-30-10, 09:32 AM

Originally Posted by Django

If 20 creative young'uns saw this project and decided to move here how much money would that bring into the city in a year, Id bet well over $180,000. Then again we could rehab five houses in this housing market.

I like these art fags Django and Beall, they gets it.
I really do hope that MoStNo does truly evolve into a creative center of ongoing activity, maybe even outreach and instruction. One of my fears is that too much east or west-coast-hip flavor will overwhelm local seasoning in the pot. The homemade soup that came out of Detroit [[techno) got its unique flavor from not being overly salted by muzics chefs elsewhere in the US. At the end of the day however, we are a melting pot of sorts because of Fordism [[so, welcome imports, if this is more than a driveby).
"Jeff," over at the call center in India is grateful for the system because it feeds HIS family. Me, not so much these days, acknowledging the grinding poverty in our city.

Meanwhile, over at Juxtapoz they recently posted this:

"This past Fall, as we have documented in full, we saw 6 artists off to Detroit to work with Powerhouse Productions as part of our 15th Anniversary Benefit and Auction project. Swoon, Ben Wolf, Monica Canilao, RETNA, Richard Colman, and Saelee Oh all created unique pieces of art in the neighborhood where the money we raised was able to buy property. The local Detroit Free Press just highlighted the project in an extensive article.

The article does a nice job of speaking about the project, connecting with Powerhouse's Mitch Cope and Gina Reichert, and also details some of the things that intially drew us to Powerhouse: their work within the community while simultaneously thinking global about how people and artists can participate around the world to make creative contributions in a new spirit.

That was at the core of our particular contribution to Powerhouse. The world is connected now as it never has been before, and each country is facing interesting economic situations and decisions in the post-industrial landscape. Detroit is a symbol in the USA, just as cities in England, Italy, Brazil, South Africa, India, and beyond are symbols of post-industrial, post-working class departure. What Powerhouse was doing was creating an energy and cycle that could be replicated in other places. Take existing infrastructure and allow artists to reimagine and rebuild the spirit of an area.

Most people understood what we were attempting in our small way [[we are an art magazine, and raising money to not involve art would have been off-base), and they will be happy with our 26-page feature in our upcoming February 2011 issue. We hope what Juxtapoz did, and Powerhouse will continue to do in Detroit, will be introduced in other cities as a way of promise and recreation within the arts.

The world is a small place, and creative people tend to see productivity and new energy as a positive domino effect to take to their corner of the globe. That was our aim.

Stay tuned for more Juxtapoz x Powerhouse Productions in Detroit in the February 2011 issue."

Just out of curiosity, dyes, will you buy the feb. mag from the newsstand?

**warsaw7** · December-30-10, 11:47 AM

I will absolutely buy this issue! Lt. Dan Bassett and DJANGO, I really appreciate your comments and your words of wisdom. I especially love the Greenwich Village reference.

**Detroitnerd** · December-30-10, 12:04 PM

Please, no hip shortened names like MoStNo. If you must give it a nickname, call it Hamsandwich.

**1KielsonDrive** · December-30-10, 01:31 PM

I'm six of one and a half dozen of the other on this project. I can see the attraction and benefit of the project, but part of my heart says that amount of money would do the neighborhood a lot of good in repairs and rehabilitation, feeding people, or even assist Hatch in converting our JAIL to an ART CENTER. Inspiration or pragmatism? Both? It's good we're talking about it. And, it seems we have a new poster. Welcome LDB.