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Rethinking the Role & Site of Social Services: Mike Kelley’s Suburban Home at MOCAD

Image via Artlog

Michelle and I visited this project when it first appeared at MOCAD back in 2010, and it’s incredible to see the next phase of this, just announced as a massive new addition to the project in Detroit that seems possibly not unlike Project Row Houses, but with a distinct Detroit feel.

From the article on Curbed:

The installation will be a replica of Kelley’s childhood home in the suburbs which will be used to provide social services to Detroit residents. Kelley himself oversaw the first stage of the project in 2010, when a mobile-home version of the suburban dwelling made a maiden voyage from downtown Detroit to visit the original Kelley home in the suburbs. The video of this, completed just before he died, is what premiered at the Whitney Biennial yesterday. Kelley’s idea was to create a symbolic reversal of the white flight that occurred in Detroit in the 1960s.

From the NYTimes article:

It will function nothing like a traditional museum or gallery and will show none of Mr. Kelley’s work, at his own insistence. The mobile-home part will remain detachable and will sometimes take its leave of the rest and journey through Detroit. The home as a whole will operate as an unconventional community service office, providing things like haircuts, social services, meeting space and a place to hold barbecues and perhaps for the homeless to pick up mail. “We’re thinking that our education staff will actually move out to the homestead and work from there,” said Marsha Miro, the acting director of the contemporary art museum.

It’s really curious to think about a long-term project like this being launched by an artist and carried forward (posthumously) by a museum, not to mention the complications of the politics of the architecture itself. I’m not sure what it will mean for the community immediately surrounding MOCAD, but it’s an incredible example to point to in terms of how we might rethink a number of institutions that provide social services.

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Rivane Neuenschwander: I Wish Your Wish

From the Artforum review of Rivane Neuenschwander’s mid-career survey, including Eu desejo o seu desejo (I Wish Your Wish) by Michael Wilson:

I WISH LIFE WAS EASY; I WISH FOR INNER PEACE; I WISH FOR A HOLIDAY ON THE BEACH. The last of these pleas–all samplings from Rivane Neuenschwander’s participatory installation Eu desejo o seu desejo (I Wish Your Wish)–seemed not only the most achievable ambition but also the most timely, as guests arriving late to the Brazilian artist’s Tuesday night opening at the New Museum looked distinctly soggy after a summer storm. The mottos were printed on ribbons arranged around the walls of the lobby, and viewers were invited to take and wear one in exchange for suggestions of their own.

From an interview on ArtBlog with New Museum’s Curatorial Associate Benjamin Godsill, “Ribbons printed with wishes from visitors at previous exhibitions hang on the wall.  You take the ribbon, tie it on your wrist, and then replace it with a wish of your own.  The wish comes true when the ribbon wears off your wrist.  So by participating in this you are helping someone else’s wish to come true.” From the NYTimes review, “It’s modeled on a tradition from the Church of Nosso Senhor do Bonfim in Bahia, Brazil: worshipers tie brightly colored silk ribbons to their wrists and wear them until they fall off, at which point their wishes are granted.”

Vaguely reminds me of the I Wish This Was project that Josh talked about a little while ago, though I enjoy that these wishes expand beyond the immediacy of the space (but it would be interesting to see this installed somewhere on an exterior wall). I saw the coverage for this show over the summer and really wished I had been able to see it… conceptualism, reciprocal art, participatory exchange, etc. A simple idea with an explosion of scale, it’s something we might keep in mind.

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Tree Museum: Public Art by Katie Holten

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oL4LqJXur48&feature=player_embedded

Kind of strangely, I read about this project in the New Yorker and momentarily confused it with Canada’s Tree Museum, but ultimately thought it was worth noting given a recent conversation we had with Edwin who came by our Office Hours last week about a potential audio-based community project.

The video above describing the Holten’s project is kind of brutal (especially the soundtrack), but it gives a good idea of the way it works—acting as a kind of series of stops on a museum tour, with a variety of trees being the markers in each neighbourhood.

100 trees give voice to 100 perspectives featured in the Grand Concourse’s TREE MUSEUM. Irish artist Katie Holten created this public art project to celebrate the communities and ecosystems along this 100 year-old boulevard. Visitors can listen in on local stories and the intimate lives of trees offered by current and former residents: from beekeepers to rappers, historians to gardeners, school kids to scientists.

You can call 718-408-2501to access the audio guide.