“Urban explorers” dare each other inside the decaying shells of once-useful factories - artist collectives paint whole buildings orange, the color of dereliction. A third of the population has left, never to return. The federal government lays down the law, former king-size industrial manufacturers choose bailouts, and foreign ownership, their days of designing and producing for the most part over. The mayor’s in jail, the city has laid off ten percent of its work force, irate citizens feel free to torch empty homes themselves, as there’s no more money for demolition.
Were this scenario a movie, it might have more than a few characters out of Mad Max, future shock a storyboard item only. But this is very real in Detroit, USA, in 2009, which is down but not out, proud home of the Big 3, Motown and Eight Mile – still, not an easy place to ride out a depression. But this is a story about creativity, about being young, or old, and making the most of it, making art, making do, and reinventing, most of all, in a very different America.
Photographs & text coming July 2009.
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