Naomi Davis: Reflections on the Public Convening for Ethical Redevelopment

Naomi Davis, Urban Sustainability Expert

On June 22, 2016, Place Lab introduced Ethical Redevelopment with a Public Convening. Held at the Logan Center for the Arts, this this interactive, theatrical event explored and showcased how residents, artists, entrepreneurs, developers, and civic leaders are joining forces to explore a more equitable approach to community transformation.

In this guest blog, urban sustainability expert Naomi Davis reflects on the Public Convening.

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ACT I

Theaster Gates experiments.

A way of thinking about islands of people: literally loved into living themselves and their neighbors as "acts-of-art." Places are made in the confluence of regulations, performance, contemplation, and questions. Is Theaster asking how places work best for art-beings?

And what would Theaster’s walk in art+ethics say to the ages if lifted from the dust of a dig by archeologists a millennium from now? Scholars and school kids judge the creativity and scruples of societies long ago and far away – an exercise in their powers of observation – but maybe without the key ingredient: intimacy. Will future folks feel pressed-up-close-and-personal where the most important question one can ask is, “how do I feel about myself in your presence?” 

Will they feel his art places had virtue? Did folks felt better about themselves there? Did folks feel better feeling about me, too?

When observing lovers court and spark, we naturally grasp the ebb and flow of feelings – but not so much when neighbors come and go through buildings. Yet, if as people move through time and place they experience “Embrace,” then hasn’t something virtuous happened? They felt loved!

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ACT II

My own heart skipped a beat at Ethical Redevelopment when guest expert Cathy Cohen moved in close on the impact of choices driven by the placemakers called developers. She put this question in their mouths:

“How will this decision demonstrate love for the young people in this community?”

— Cathy Cohen, Black Youth Project 100

Case closed. This was a litmus test anyone could understand and stand for. Wasn’t it right/on?

Still…there are so many ways to love, doesn’t the question become “how do I want to be loved?”

Do I want to be loved by a high price for my home and a soft kiss goodbye? Do I want to be loved by a new boom box next door beating my wall like it wants in? Do I want to be loved by a flourishing banner reminding me to "stand my ground, before it’s too late"? Do I want to be loved by "freedom of choice" in spite of my race and class?

Thus my mad crush on Kerwin Charles percolated at Ethical Redevelopment when he questioned:

“What is the role of the previous residents who’ve lived through everything and all of it, and how do we spread the gains [the pleasures of beauty?] across historical residents and new entrants?”

— Kerwin Charles, UChicago Harris School of Public Policy

The “long arch” of Dr. Martin Luther King was a ‘journey to justice’ – a journey requiring the strength to love all those who didn’t love you back with their processes, distributions, outcomes…or redevelopments.

I’m clear: I want to feel good about myself in the presence of redevelopment. I want to feel good about my freedom of choice – that my freedom of choice matters more than the freedom of the market to extend America’s extreme racial wealth disparity…to foster my failure in the real estate market of cash buyers…to sacrifice my displacement on the altar of profit…to profit again from the structures of inequity.

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ACT III

As a “Curator of Questions” I selected an audience question about Ethical Development and ‘capitalism’ – I thought, “yaaassss, where the rubber meets the road…”

The question was passed to the room where straight away capitalism was declared unethical, unnatural – because it enshrined monopoly…because it fed on scarcity. Two guests unconditionally declared it must die.

And after a robust run, the night was done – a performance metaphor for The 9 Principles of Ethical Development – another Theaster work of art. A complex program with so much flourish but also simply elegant…a profusion with a calming effect…a program that left me at peace.

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Courtesy of Naomi Davis

closing

The archeological dig of not a millennium, but a month later – 

I observe I want to feel the virtues of life that imitates art. Judgment, grace, and mercy are the instruments of God, just as art is a gift from God to the province of man. Our Creator loves us unconditionally – all we need do is love ourselves enough to know it and choose our god-like powers of design/build. Art also requires our wisdom: its prism separates us inside, where we must decide if it loves us – and if not, leave it. And when redevelopment doesn’t love us, our freedom of choice not to leave requires we replace hateful old infrastructure that would rob us of our sovereign right.

At Blacks in Green™ we use the prism of love to separate the visible spectrum of Environment, Economy, and Equity. We teach The 8 Principles of Green-Village-Building™ – The 12 Propositions of Grannynomics™ – “The Conservation Lifestyle/The Beautiful Life” – “The Age of the Neighbor Investor” – and preach that “Nothing Trumps Ownership of the Land” – especially for those whom the market tends to target, marginalize, disinvest, and then displace. In that order, we have been systematically and repeatedly removed from whatever homesteads ‘those-who-don’t-love-us’ wanted. For BIG™ – redevelopment requires a new currency exchange – where homes aren’t mere commodities…profits flow on a level playing field…and control of who comes-and-goes is powered by neighbor agency.

Audience response board.

I observe that here in the Centennial of America’s Great Migration, many African Americans feel at the mercy of a market that does not love us, the purgatory of ‘a dream deferred’…no 40 acres, no mule – even as we hold the inalienable, God-given power in our hands to create a New Promised Land whose love we do feel. We needn’t yield to demands that the art-we-are and the places-we-make can only be improved by adding another color. We are the artists and monochromes are also beautiful. Who assumes a Chinese enclave must be improved with the addition of Greeks?

I love myself, and I love art that reminds me I am beautiful as I am. I want to live in a place that loves me, too. I want to live where the gains of beauty are sweetly shared…where I’m more important than profit…where seven generations ahead my children and the archeologists can feel it was so.

Intention, policy, and practice – in that order – bend the long arc of justice. Kudos to Theaster for putting love first, where it belongs.

Ah, the art of the deal.

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Join the conversation on the Ethical Redevelopment Public Forum.

Ethical Redevelopment Principle #4 - The Indeterminate

Contending with the unknown is part of the unorthodox thinking underlying Ethical Redevelopment. The Indeterminate, Principle #4, makes space for free-thinking and welcomes intuition and faith as guides. Traditional development projects and funding structures demand certainty, and seek to fully crystalize the end product before development begins. The Indeterminate takes its cue from the way many artists create work—observing the unfolding process, responding to the needs of the moment, and rerouting as necessary. Beginning with a vision and an open mind about the path forward may reveal moments you couldn’t have imagined.

“Humans believe themselves free of fear
when there is no longer anything unknown.”

— "Dialectic of Enlightenment," Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno

This unfettered method of making employed by artists is most evident in Dadaism, an art movement that embraced uncertainty, promoted collaboration, and championed chance. The horror and chaos of World War I gave rise to the Dada movement and its adherents, artists who raged against what they saw as the destructive intellectual rigidity of everyday society. Dada arts, literature, happenings, demonstrations, and philosophy spread a strong message against the carnage and cruelty that could result from inflexible rationalism. The Indeterminate echoes the sentiment that the pursuit of perfect knowledge, of certainty, is an enormous obstacle to redevelopment efforts.

“Wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.”

— -Toni Morrison, from "Song of Solomon"

THE INDETERMINATE IN ACTION

Eventually becoming the largest community art project in the world, the AIDS Memorial Quilt began as an activist gesture in 1985 at the end of the annual march in San Francisco that commemorates slain city Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone. On the walls of the San Francisco Federal Building, marchers taped cards bearing the names of friends and loved ones who had died of AIDS, numbering over 1000 in that city alone. The display immediately resembled the patchwork style of a quilt and organizer Cleve Jones soon teamed up with friends to make 3-by-6-foot fabric panels to commemoration victims of the disease.

As word spread, panels arrived from across the country and, in 1987, the first showing of the quilt on the National Mall in Washington, DC covered a space larger than a football field. As the death toll increased, so did the quilt, which not only served as a memorial, but as a tool for awareness and understanding of the devastating impact of the disease, as a visual representation of the number of lives taken, and as a fundraiser for AIDS service organizations. In 1989, the Quilt was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize, project chapters and affiliates exist across the globe, an archive collects the images and stories, and, in 2005, it won a “Save America’s Treasures” Federal Grant for conservation and sustainability planning.

WHAT'S YOUR PROJECT?

By asking his fellow marchers to write names on cards, Cleve Jones couldn’t have foreseen where this action would go. What idea do you have that feels like a beginning without an end? Try it out in the comments below.

Ethical Redevelopment Principle #3 - Pedagogical Moments

Knowledge transfer and skill sharing happen in casual and formal manners.

In working with others towards a shared mission in your neighborhood, consider how to structure relationships so that the skills of one resident are utilized and others can learn from working with them. How do you create a community workshop? Who will benefit? Who will lend their skills? What types of skills will be shared? 

“Learning is not a product of school but the lifelong attempt to acquire it.”

— Albert Einstein

Ethical Redevelopment looks for pedagogical moments that occur when setting up a food stand, offering art instruction in unusual places, sorting through a collection of books so that a community can access it, and making an art center more functional. When budgets tighten, arts and cultural activities have long been cut out of public institutions, programs, and infrastructure. In disinvested communities, children and adults often lack opportunities for creative exploration. Local museums and centers close, performance spaces and bookstores go out of business, and public gathering spaces fall into disrepair. The contributions of artists and cultural makers are set aside as a neighborhood’s economic stability is threatened. As such, the artistic path is devalued and left unexplored.

“I think for so long, especially for African Americans, those that work in the arts or work as artists probably didn’t get a lot of encouragement 20 years ago from family about pursuing that path. So the more we can educate people that you can make a living, you can make a worthwhile contribution, that this is a road for you to travel. Yeah, it helps.”

— Michelle Boone, Commissioner, City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events

PEDAGOGY IN ACTION

With a philosophy very much aligned with work being done by Theaster Gates on Chicago’s South Side, The Laundromat Project in New York City sees art as a hands-on, local agent of change in neighborhoods. Using everyday spaces like laundromats, artists set up community-based projects that directly engage with the residents in the neighborhoods of Bedford Stuyvesant, Harlem, and Hunts Point. From their website: “the skills and strategies for igniting creativity are made broadly available to everyday people and purposefully applied as tools for visioning a new and better world.” They measure success by the increase of residents’ involvement in the civic and cultural life of the neighborhood owing to a sense of belonging and investment. Recent projects include exploratory stop-animation workshops with project screenings during the Harlem Barbeque Summit, and a ice cream cart in the Latino Bronx community equipped with a pollution monitor that offers free ice cream in exchange for residents’ stories about the impact of climate change locally or their home country. These moments of exchange, sharing, and creation are vital actions in expanding the imagination of the possible and utilizing existing talent to skillshare for mutual benefit.

WHAT HAVE YOU SHARED?

Reflect on this past week: what’s an everyday Pedagogical Moment you’ve been a part of? Describe an opportunity you’ve had to share your knowledge base with a friend, family member, or neighbor. Tell us about it in the comments below.

Carson Poole: Reflections from the 24th Congress for New Urbanism

Carson Poole, Place Lab's project specialist, attended the 24th Congress for New Urbanism, June 8–11 in Detroit. In this SITE entry, Carson shares some reflections and takeaways from his experience at the event.

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It was my first time visiting Detroit, and I was really struck by the monumental scale of downtown (where most of the conference took place), and the number of projects going on in the City that are coming from neighborhood entrepreneurs, nonprofits, City government, and the private sector. Major developments include the M1 rail line, continuing revitalization of the riverfront, conversion of vacant land to green infrastructure through low-impact development, and anchor-institution based development in the University, Hospital, and “Tech Town” areas, to name a few. There is so much work being done in Detroit that it is hard to get your arms around all of it, but it also means there are plenty of opportunities to get involved.

Conceptual image of Detroit's QLINE. Rendering: M1 Rail

The Congress for New Urbanism is a membership-based organization that focuses largely on urban design and policy related to design and development, especially zoning and building codes. It’s members come from the fields of urban design, architecture + landscape architecture, and planning. Their key issues are transportation (and walkability), health, environment, finance, and added after last year’s congress, equity. The conference was organized with a different theme to each day, and several tracks that ran through the entire week. 

There were some fantastic speakers and workshops throughout the week at the conference, including Senior Fellow at The Kresge Foundation Carol Coletta; Detroit Planning Director Maurice Cox; former commissioner of the NYC Department of Transportation Janette Sadik-Khan; and former Mayor of Charleston, SC, Joe Riley, who gave a really amazing presentation about his 40 year run as mayor, and all of the work he had done that put human-scale planning, housing, and community-economic development at the forefront of the City’s agenda. 

Several speeches during the conference focused largely on the failures of social policy as key drivers of urban problems, and that these policies (or lack thereof) must be understood as influencing the poor design of communities and buildings, and not viewed as separate phenomenon. I took this to mean that you can design a community with all of the aspects that guide new urbanist principles, but without strong policies in place that guide their use, they ultimately fail. 

A speaker who particularly stood out to me was Scot Spencer, from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Mr. Spencer works in Baltimore, and drew a direct line between police brutality, racist policy, resulting social unrest, and issues of economic opportunity in Baltimore. He challenged the attendees in the audience to think beyond just issues of walkability, design, and mixed-used development to consider the broader landscape of policy and action that influence one’s experience of a city. 

From the workshops and seminars I attended, I think the two most important concepts I came away with that are directly tied to the work undertaken by Place Lab:

Incremental Development as a way of building neighborhood wealth. By enabling many small scale developer-residents, incremental development is a tactic for creating reciprocal benefits within a neighborhood. An Incremental Development Alliance was just funded by a Knight Cities challenge grant, and I met with one of the founders. We had a discussion about their work—producing toolkits, guides, webinars, and doing in-person workshops—as a way to ensure that local people are able to take advantage and capitalize on any value created in the neighborhoods in which work is being done. I was reminded of the work that Naomi Davis, at Blacks in Green and the South Side Homesteaders project, is doing already. 

“We show up, look around, and as long as it doesn’t look like the roof is going to cave onto these kids’ heads, we let them do what they want.”

— paraphrasing the Mayor of Detroit, in relation to "Pink Zones"

Lean Urbanism is a concept that happened somewhat by accident in Detroit, but one that Detroit City government and the CNU are building upon as a positive development. Lean urbanism lowers the barriers to entry and allows for more people to get involved in place-based work. Detroit city government's years-long inability to regulate development left room for innovation by residents, and allowed for people to do adaptive reuse or redevelopment without onerous permitting and oversight processes. Detroit is now exploring lean urbanism “pink zones,” where permitting and code enforcement is simplified and in many cases reduced. The Mayor of Detroit explained it as, roughly: “We show up, look around, and as long as it doesn’t look like the roof is going to cave onto these kids’ heads, we let them do what they want.” It’s good to see this concept, already in action and being piloted in many areas around the country, is gaining acceptance in the planning field. Coupled with workforce development and skill building, applying Lean Urbanism will mean that people have better opportunities to get involved in development within their own neighborhoods, build value and wealth around them, and not have to rely solely on the resources of outsiders.

“What we reject is the ‘Help the Negro Industry.’ People coming into our community, thinking they know best, trying to save us. We can save ourselves...The ‘Help the Negro Industry’ is what allowed billions of dollars to come down for urban renewal, but the urban did not get renewed. We are absolutely committed that urban renewal not be repeated.”

— Naomi Davis, Founder of Blacks in Green, in a 2014 interview with Newsone

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NOTES

Mays, Jeff. "Naomi Davis: Blacks in Green Founder Pushing For Self-Sufficient Communities Using The Green Economy." Newsone, 2014. http://newsone.com/2902328/naomi-davis-blacks-in-green/

Ethical Redevelopment Principle #2 - Engaged Participation

Deindustrialization, redlining, urban renewal policies, mass incarceration, sudden population shifts: it is no simple task to redress the effects that communities have suffered from decades of disinvestment. The ecology resulting from a decline in resources, such as abandoned properties, under-education, neighborhood violence, unemployment, is not a result of any single privation, and neither can the reversal of such disinvestment be accomplished by a single person or entity.

“Real, sustainable community change requires the initiative and engagement of community members.”

— Helene D. Gayle, CEO, McKinsey Social Initiative

Equitable transformation of a community is dependent on the agency of the members that live and work in that community. Affordable housing, living wage employment, quality education, recreation and retail, health and social services, transportation and infrastructure—all are made more powerful when a community is not merely a recipient, but an active participant in its development. Civic engagement brings both internal stakeholders and external stakeholders to a shared platform.

Ethical Redevelopment proposes developing an engagement framework that calls into question who does the work and with and for whom. As many organizations and institutions consider “engagement strategies” that may be more about informing a public—a one-way relationship—the willing investment of participants’ time, talents, and resources in a given place redefines the architectural, cultural, social, and economic landscape. By engaging with a multiplicity of people who share in the transparent negotiation and implementation of a vision, place-based work integrates a sense of social responsibility, neighborliness, and authenticity.

Engaged Participation is the development of authentic relationships with people who already believe in the place: locals embedded by proximity, those connected by a desire to contribute or commitment to a mission. The value of the relationship is in the intimacy, not in the duration. Engage for as long as it makes sense to engage. This intimacy sparks commitment to a vision, and the neighbors, staff, and visitors become participatory producers—more than “consumers”—by tapping into different access points to find themselves in the work. The work is for many, with many, and, ultimately, by many.

ENGAGED PARTICIPATION IN ACTION

Providing multiple access points is key to authentic community participation, and such points are often developed as a the result of key partnerships between stakeholders. Boston Creates, a year-long cultural planning process, partnered with artist collective Department of Play to explore the ways in which Bostonians engaged with arts and culture. This partnership connected urban planning and the lived experiences of Boston's communities to inform the cultural plan for the city by "[infusing] creativity, imagination, artistry and fun into a citywide planning process."

Take a moment to think about your community and the opportunities that exist within it. How can you, operating as a resident and a citizen, champion Engaged Participation?

Carson Poole: Reflections from 'Making the West Side'

Carson Poole, Place Lab's project specialist, attended the Making the West Side Public Forum and Reception on May 19 at the Hull-House Museum. In this SITE entry, Carson shares some reflections and takeaways from his experience at the event.

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Carson Poole

Richard Anderson, from the National Public Housing Museum (Chicago) and Princeton, talked about the history of University of Illinois at Chicago construction, and the well-known displacement that occurred. The chord that really struck with me, and I think many other people in the room, is the poisonous legacy that exists because of the negative impacts that top down planning and development projects, in Chicago and beyond, have had on communities. It brought to mind the construction, neglect, and demolition of public housing in America, and the CHA’s struggles with it’s Plan for Transformation [see notes at end for links to more about the Plan for Transformation].
 
Understandably, there’s a deep mistrust of large scale interventions in planning and development, which sometimes hinders progress and holds us back from making deep investments in communities. I think that this mistrust is an important piece of the picture, and one that calls for better community engagement + empowerment approaches from the various public and private entities involved in city-building.

“All that modernist urbanism failed on both sides of the Atlantic. It was a tremendous intellectual crisis because of the extent of the social meltdown and because absolute power of design and implementation had been granted to the planners.”

— excerpt from interview with Andres Duany

It’s interesting to me that this mistrust spans the political spectrum—from conservatives who tout limited government and little to no public spending, to progressives who draw upon the history of urban renewal and espouse a “tactical urbanism” by way of Jane Jacobs approach to planning. I thought back to this interview with Andres Duany, founder of the Congress for New Urbanism and an influential planner and urbanist. He championed the need for regional-scale, top down interventions in things like transportation infrastructure and renewable energy development, that will inevitably require compromise from residents, but must take a primarily resident perspective and design at the human scale in order to avoid the terrible mistakes and willful displacement that has occurred in the past. 
 
Basically, we can’t all be NIMBYs (Not in my Back Yard) and BANANAs (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything), if we want to accomplish real, sustainable change— but we also can’t plow the Skyway through the South Side. It’s about finding that sweet spot for human scale interventions, and that happens through sincere engagement and providing people with real opportunities for participation and decision-making power.

Oil painting from the exhibition As Cosmopolitans & Strangers, an exhibition that explores Mexican Art of the Jewish Diaspora and the complexities of diversity. Part of the permanent collection of the National Museum of Mexican Art. Image: Gunther Gerzso (1915-2000), Yellow–Green–Blue / Amarillo–Verde–Azul, 1984, oil on Masonite, NMMA Permanent Collection 2009.45.

Another speaker, Rosa Cabrera, from the UIC Latino Cultural Center, talked about her work studying cultural institutions in Chicago, and the difficulties that these institutions face embracing the multitude of perspectives, values, and identities that exist within cultural communities, rather than viewing them in monolithic terms.
 
All communities, cultural or otherwise, are constantly in flux, as new waves of immigration, or in some cases, depopulation, create changes in values and in shared experiences. The challenge to cultural organizations is to explore intersectional identities and intergenerational differences in culture. Cabrera felt that many cultural institutions have a need for capacity building and training aimed squarely at this issue in order for these diverse viewpoints to be expressed.

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NOTES

Chicago Housing Authorities Plan for Transformation

Official CHA site.

CHA report, The Plan for Transformation: An Update on Relocation [pdf]. April 2011. 

Urban Institute, CHA Families and the Plan for Transformation. A collection of research, articles, and papers the UI has produced over more than a decade of following CHA families during relocation.

 Sudhir Venkatesh and Isil Celimli, Tearing Down the Community. NHI.org, 2014

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RSVP for the Public Convening on Ethical Redevelopment, a free and open public event at which Place Lab will explore and showcase how residents, artists, entrepreneurs, developers, and civic leaders are joining forces in a more equitable process for community revitalization.

Isis Ferguson: Reflections from 'Making the West Side'

Isis Ferguson, Place Lab program manager, attended the Making the West Side Public Forum and Reception on May 19 at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum. In this SITE entry, Isis shares some reflections and takeaways from her experience at the event.

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Isis Ferguson

Alice O’Connor participated in the wrap-up portion of the program. It’s been more than a week since she made her remarks, and I am still moved by the notion of inevitability briefly mentioned by O’Connor.

Neighborhood development efforts often focus on thwarting rapid change, a kind of fundamental alteration that ushers in new amenities, tourists or “pioneering” new residents, resulting in the dislocation or displacement of neighborhood residents and entrepreneurs. In short, locals get priced out. Ironically, in this neighborhood development scenario, it is often the very same local people who made a place work—made it vibrant, attractive, and distinctive—that end up “choosing” to leave. The staying power of locals for as long as some are able to hold out, is extraordinary considering it is done against the crushing weight of redlining, restrictive covenants, de jure segregation and other policies or practices deployed to maintain systems of inequality.

The evolution of a neighborhood does not have to follow a singular, certain path of transformation.

I’m interested in exploring with others the processes and strategies that have historically been enacted to preserve neighborhood identity, authenticity and resident agency while simultaneously embracing the fluidity and continuous development that is at the heart of vibrant communities.

Isn’t displacement avoidable? Can’t we find examples or create circumstances and policies so that development and redevelopment do not have to be synonymous with gentrification?

On May 27, The New York Times published The End of Black Harlem, an article by Michael Henry Adams lamenting the rapid gentrification of a section of NYC once considered the epicenter of black cultural life in America. Adams mentions a conversation he has with a group of neighborhood boys curious about a demonstration chant they hear, "Save Harlem Now!" Adam reflects, "It was painful to realize how even a kid could see in every new building, every historic renovation, every boutique clothing shop—indeed in every tree and every flower in every park improvement—not a life-enhancing benefit, but a harbinger of his own displacement.”

““These are people who, in saying ‘I don’t see color,’ treat the neighborhood like a blank slate. They have no idea how insulting they are being, denying us our heritage and our stake in Harlem’s future. And, far from government intervention to keep us in our homes, houses of worship and schools, to protect buildings emblematic of black history, we see policies like destructive zoning, with false “trickle down” affordability, changes that incentivize yet more gentrification, sure to transfigure our Harlem forever.””

— excerpt, "The End of Black Harlem"

Trumpeter Clark Terry (pictured) walks with his son Rudolph outside the Apollo Theater in 1955. Photo: G. Marshall Wilson/Ebony Collection/AP

Adam’s narrative about Harlem in the contemporary moment connects to a long legacy of urban policies which have had deeply felt material, social and financial consequences on people and place. Harlem’s own son, writer James Baldwin, famously stated in 1963 that federal 'Urban Renewal' policies were actually a not-so-thinly veiled practice of 'Negro Removal.' This observation has relevance and potency in the changing urban landscapes of Harlem in New York, Detroit, and Chicago in 2016.

For those of us committed to the dynamism of communities, what case studies can we be pointed to that provide tactics and approaches for resiliency that also include a space for change and variation? To push and mobilize for more equitable cities, people need more options than blight/stagnation on one end and investment/
gentrification on the other end of the spectrum. I look forward to the numerous Making the West Side community conversation programs that JAHHM has planned throughout the year.

— Isis Ferguson, May 2016

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RSVP for the Public Convening on Ethical Redevelopment, a free and open public event at which Place Lab will explore and showcase how residents, artists, entrepreneurs, developers, and civic leaders are joining forces in a more equitable process for community revitalization.

Purpose-driven development: St. Laurence project

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Former St. Laurence Elementary School in Grand Crossing. Photo: Place Lab.

What spaces exist for people to get involved in the development processes occurring around them? Who has a say in choosing what buildings will be demolished and which are allowed to remain? What happens to a community when it loses a school, and what can we collectively imagine will happen inside these unique and valuable community assets?

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Inside the now abandoned St. Laurence. Photo: Place Lab.

Schools, and school buildings, are important loci of community, learning, and shared belief in the future. When school buildings and other community centers are closed, they are often simply abandoned, creating not only a visual eyesore, but a striking representation of public disinvestment and relegation of those communities. As Patrick Kerkstra observes in this Next City article on school closures: "...it’s not surprising that many shuttered schools are often simply left to rot for years by cash-stripped districts loathe to spend money on maintenance for empty buildings. It’s a state of affairs that can generate blight and, in time, pose genuine safety hazards." And it isn't just the building closure itself that impacts the neighborhood; the loss of a school sends myriad ripples throughout a community. The article goes on to note that "closing schools is almost always traumatic. Some consider the selection process arbitrary and open to political influence. And once the final decisions are made, students and families must scramble to find alternatives. Teachers are reassigned or laid off."

Because of their symbolic and practical importance to communities, renovating and re-activating these buildings presents unique opportunities for public conversation around the patterns of urban development, neglect, and reinvention, among local residents who are directly effected by these trends.

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Place Lab team members Carson Poole and Nootan Bharani working on site clean-up at St. Laurence. Photo: Place Lab.

Place Lab is currently working on a demonstration project called Board Up, a community engagement series that involves communities in reimagining the possibilities of disused spaces. The first Board Up involves the vacant St. Laurence Elementary School in Greater Grand Crossing, Chicago. Concepts for the future of St. Laurence may include makerspace that provides education and job training in industrial design and fabrication that will augment neighbors’ skills and expand employment prospects.

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The windows at St. Laurence prior to boarding. Photo: Place Lab.

This summer, young people in the Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood will engage with the reimagining of St. Laurence through artistic intervention, using the windows in the building as a canvas that will provide comment on the possibilities of St. Laurence. Drawing from the history of the community and the collections at the Stony Island Arts Bank, Chicago artist Ruben Aguirre will lead a group of youth and explore pattern-making as a lens through which we can view culture and identity.  

The project will create murals for the boards that now cover the windows in the building, beginning the building’s transformation from abandoned to activated space. St. Laurence is rich with opportunities to tap into the latent capacity for change and artistry that exists among the community’s networks. These opportunities are what we call pedagogical moments, and can serve as a foundation on which a project is built. They are moments of exchange— simultaneous teaching and learning— that scale the impact of our work and move us forward. The third of our 9 Principles of Ethical Redevelopment, pedagogical moments are intentionally woven throughout the St. Laurence project and other Place Lab projects to maximize the scale and scope of impact

We'll provide updates this summer on progress at St. Laurence here on the SITE blog. Check back, and look out for an announcement for the public unveiling of the murals in August.

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Windows lining a hall at St. Laurence. Photo: Place Lab.

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Update: An earlier version of this blog entry referred to Place Lab's work at St. Laurence as redevelopment. The blog has been revised to clarify that Place Lab is involved in a community engagement project at the site.

Ethical Redevelopment Principle #1 - Repurpose + Re-propose

The first Principle in the 9 Principles of Ethical Redevelopment, "Repurpose + Re-propose" considers the power of seeing possibility in the places, things, and people that surround you and the transgression inherent in doing so. Visit the Place Lab website for the full current description of this idea at http://placelab.uchicago.edu/ethical-redevelopment/

In an era of disposability, it is common for materials that have outlived their original purpose to be deemed useless or dated and then discarded. It's considered expedient to tear down a dilapidated building rather than renovate. Often, expedient is synonymous with cheaper. What gets lost or missed with policies that only prioritize new or innovative? 

Preservation is a form of redevelopment and can be transformational for a community. The Principle of Repurpose + Re-propose asserts that not only can old resources be allocated to new endeavors, but that objects and projects do not have to be monetized to be useful. Artists are renowned for transforming objects into art, for transposing the common into the extraordinary. This is artistry, and artistry is alchemy—it allows one thing to become another.

Alchemy is a kind of philosophy: a kind of
thinking that leads to a way of understanding. 
— Marcel Duchamp

With limited financial resources many artists, activities, stewards, and neighbors have acted as local alchemists. They've worked with what and who was available, and turned deficiencies into abundances.

ALCHEMY IN ACTION - OBJECTS
Chakaia Booker is a sculptor whose work transforms discarded construction materials into art. Booker's extensive body of work encompasses performance art, photography, clothing, and textiles. Her work in transforming old tires into complex assemblages fuses the artist's explorations of ecology, racial and economic difference, globalization, and gender. Booker has stated that tires resonate with her "for their versatility and rich range of historical and cultural associations."

ALCHEMY IN ACTION - PEOPLE
Cities like Detroit are grappling with myriad issues resulting from the collapse of once integral industries. Populations that developed skills to work in now contracting or obsolete industries are struggling to adapt to new economic realities—as are companies in need of an increased labor force. Companies like Shinola, a high-end wristwatch manufacturer in Detroit, are leveraging the manufacturing experience of the local population into employable skills. Shinola transforms these basic skills by flying in expert watchmakers from Thailand and Switzerland to train employees. For Shinola, the time and expense is ultimately worth it to ensure the company can prosper in its own city.

SEE YOU ON JUNE 22
Take a moment to think about your community and the opportunities that exist within it. How can you, operating as an alchemist, Repurpose + Re-propose? Share your ideas in the comments below, and be prepared to share them at the Public Convening on Ethical Redevelopment on June 22.

RSVP for the Public Convening, a free and open public event.

Ethical Redevelopment: An Introduction

Ethical Redevelopment makes the case for mindful city-building. By utilizing cross-city networks and cross-sector innovation, Ethical Redevelopment encapsulates a philosophy by which to shift the value system from conventional, profit-driven development practices to conscientious interventions in the urban context. It is articulated by an emerging set of 9 Principles that were drawn from artist-led, neighborhood-based development work on Chicago's South Side. Place Lab, part of the University of Chicago's Arts + Public Life initiative, is introducing the 9 Principles in their early stages of development in order to share and refine with other willing urban practitioners who believe in spatial equity for cities. On Wednesday, June 22, 2016, Place Lab will host a free and open public Convening about Ethical Redevelopment. To learn more, visit: placelab.uchicago.edu/public-convenings/

Place Lab is preparing to publicly present their ongoing investigation and demonstration of projects that make the case for mindful city-building. Through a series of Public Convenings + Salon Sessions, Place Lab will share the 9 Principles of Ethical Redevelopment. Through the social learning network developed at the Salon Sessions, Place Lab and selected practitioners will workshop projects from around the country to share ideas, explore paths to overcoming obstacles, and consider methods of implementation.

Rooted in artist-led, neighborhood-based development work actively occurring on Chicago’s South Side, these evolving Principles emerged from the work of artist and urban planner Theaster Gates, Jr. In the video above, Gates discusses some of the assumptions underlying Ethical Redevelopment. 

UNDERSTANDING ETHICAL REDEVELOPMENT
The 9 Principles encapsulate a methodology that support the creation and sustainability of successful communities. Rather than calling Ethical Redevelopment new or innovative, it’s more accurate to consider Ethical Redevelopment as an atypical process for transformation that speaks to, and builds on, ideas and work already being done in communities. A people-focused approach to development is simply not as widely practiced as traditional forms of neighborhood development which prioritize profit over community — the type of development that spurs gentrification.

“Gentrification is a standing word for lots of other things that people really mean. When people in poor black communities use the word gentrification, they’re asking specific questions. If something good happens here, will I be forced out? Can I still afford to live here? Will the social constructs that governed how I lived here change?"— Theaster Gates, interview with the Chicago Tribune

Values, process, and aim are what distinguish Ethical Redevelopment from gentrification: robust public life requires a belief in and devotion to place in advance of investment. While there is no single solution to the myriad challenges cities face, Ethical Redevelopment provides a framework for creative revitalization of communities.

As we approach our first Public Convening for Ethical Redevelopment (June 22, 2016), we will be highlighting each of the 9 Principles with short videos, placing each Principle in context through one of our real-world projects, and encouraging you to engage with us by asking questions, sharing your thoughts, and considering how you can leverage these concepts to make an impact on your communities.

YOUR TURN — LET'S HEAR FROM YOU
As Gates observes, Ethical Redevelopment is a work in progress. We need your input to shape the conversation. Are there assumptions you feel we forgot? How can development occur without displacement? Tell us what you think in the comments section.

Don't forget to RSVP for the Public Convening for Ethical Redevelopment.

PLAT|FORMS : Where We Began

Established in 2014 by a Knight Foundation grant to Arts + Public Life at the University of Chicago, Place Lab is a team of professionals from the diverse fields of law, urban planning, architecture, design, social work, arts administration, and gender and cultural studies. Place Lab extends much of the team’s project management, design, programming, real estate, community building, and documentation acumen towards advancing arts and culture place-based projects on the mid-South Side of Chicago. In February 2016, Place Lab became a joint enterprise between Arts + Public Life and the Harris School of Public Policy to bring together artists, policymakers, faculty, and students to design and implement new approaches to urban development. Led by renowned artist and UChicago faculty member Theaster Gates, this partnership merges Chicago Harris’ Cultural Policy Center’s commitment to cultural policy and evidence-based analysis with Place Lab’s work at Arts + Public Life on arts- and culture-led neighborhood transformation. Learn more at placelab.uchicago.edu.

Welcome to Place Lab! Our website provides a wealth of information about us, but we encourage you to follow our blog for greater insight on what we do, how we do it, and why. In this blog, we will be showing you the progression of our work; inviting you to take a look at our projects currently in development; sharing thoughts about arts- and culture-based, community-driven redevelopment; and guiding you through a developing model for mindful city-building called The 9 Principles of Ethical Redevelopment.

But before we dive in, we'd like to provide a quick overview of where Place Lab began.

Place Lab was established by the University of Chicago's Arts + Public Life initiative in 2014 with a three-year grant from the Knight Foundation. Place Lab includes professionals from the diverse fields of law, urban planning, architecture, design, social work, arts administration, and gender and cultural studies. As a Chicago-based organization, the team concentrates much of its efforts in advancing place-based projects located on Chicago's mid-South Side. We are committed to defining Ethical Redevelopment Principles and fostering a network of like-minded artists, urban planners, design professionals, developers, community members and policy experts.

In February 2016, Place Lab entered into a partnership with the University of Chicago's Harris School of Public Policy to further develop a joint vision around creation, implementation, and measurement of culture-based public policy. Theaster Gates, Jr., professor of Visual Arts and director of Arts + Public Life, stated that the partnership would create new synergies between art and public policy, allowing for increased intellectual inquiry about how cities change and improve because of the integration of arts and culture. In Gates' words:

“Through an innovative combination of research and practice, Place Lab will provide local, state, federal and international policymakers with effective, creative alternatives to current development strategies. In particular, Place Lab will focus on approaches to community development in which the arts and artist play a prominent role.” 

We first introduced ourselves and our work with the exhibition PLAT | FORMS. Staged in the Arts Incubator, one of Gates's revitalized spaces, PLATS | FORMS translated our often highly technical, research-based work into an engaging, interactive space that involved the public in asking critical questions, exploring ideas about culture-based renewal, providing feedback, and playing a critical role in community-building efforts. Watch the video excerpt above for a short look at what PLAT | FORMS entailed.

In conjunction with PLAT | FORMS, we hosted a series of open conversations called GROWING PAINS that engaged the community in dialogue about public art, public schools, and public housing. You can watch the full video documentation on PLAT | FORMS and GROWING PAINS here.

Again, our goal with this blog is to share and engage— feel free to ask questions, or provide your own thoughts. 

We'll see you in the next entry!

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