Daniel Tucker writes on ReMake Estate

Daniel Tucker from AREA Chicago writes on ReMake Estate:
http://miscprojects.com/2010/09/14/summer-harvest/

Front Page News

Remake Estate is officially open! The launch was a huge success. We had tons of healthy soup and food, the Compass group had set up a huge shaded marque anchored by four cars, we had speakers including Kim and Jonathon from CDOP and Trey and Trev dressed in their MJ finest dancing their lil hearts out to help launch the garden and mural.

We also made front page news of the Post Tribune- which probably helped us get heaps of people down.

Below is the article text:

Gary inspires project by Australian artists
Dilapidated home used for mural, overgrown lot a garden
July 17, 2010 BY JON SEIDEL

GARY – The bright colors pop through the residential block in the 2400 block of Massachusetts Street, drawing eyes toward an image of a tin man, a lion and a scarecrow. Emblazoned in paint across the front of the empty home are the words “Remake Estate.” The characters on the side are drawn not directly from the classic “The Wizard of Oz” but its 1978 reimagining, “The Wiz.” And that scarecrow, of course, is Gary native Michael Jackson, who starred in the movie with Diana Ross.
The artwork, by Gary-based Higher Art Creative Learning Center, was prompted by a pair of Australian artists leading a project that includes a community garden by the house. “It just seemed a natural link that he’d be the scarecrow for the garden,” said Zanny Begg of You Are Here.
Begg and Keg de Souza, who have worked on similar projects in the Australian suburbs, are in town for an artistic residency funded by the Australia Council for the Arts, according to their website. A grand opening where they will discuss their work is planned for 5 tonight.
The Remake Estate name is drawn from an unrealized Fake Estates project by the artist Gordon Matta-Clark, who bought up unusable slivers of land in New York City. He planned to use them as sites of “anarchitectural interventions” but died before he had the chance. Visitors to tonight’s grand opening will have a chance to view the mural painted on the house at 2404 Massachusetts.
Begg said the property was donated by the nearby St. John Baptist Church. County records show the empty lot where Begg and de Souza have planted their garden is owned by the church, but the house is owned by Bin Yun Liu of Chicago, who owes delinquent taxes. The garden, Begg said, will remain after the artists leave town. Filled with peppers, tomatoes, herbs and melons, Begg said it is meant for anyone who wants to pick food from it. “If you take something, just make sure you water them,” Begg said.
Begg and de Souza have been working with members of the Central District Organizing Project, a community activist group. While the garden is a short stroll away from the group’s headquarters, member Jonathan Wilson said CDOP shouldn’t necessarily be the only group caring for it. “We want to try to make it so the whole community does,” Wilson said.
Begg and de Souza will also premiere a “thumbnail sketch” of a film they’ve been preparing that weaves interviews with Gary residents between clips from “The Wiz.” Begg said many themes in the movie, such as oppression and broken dreams, can be applied to the problems faced by Gary residents. Even the characters relate to the city, Begg said. The tin man represents the steel mills, while the lion symbolizes courage.
Begg said she and de Souza had a chance to interview Mayor Rudy Clay for their film. “He was really generous with his time,” Begg said. However, she said there will be a nod toward a recent comment by the mayor at tonight’s event. When he announced plans to build a tribute to Jackson’s family last month, Clay said people in Gary sometimes throw “poison in the soup,” and he asked them not to derail the project. Begg said soup will be served tonight, despite the heat. She promised it will be healthy and “unpoisoned.”

Meeting Mr Mayor

Flustered, sweaty and rushed from Another Dimension (it’s actually a beauty salon we filmed an interview in) we arrived at Gary Town Hall. To our relief the front desk was expecting us and ushered us up the grand marble staircase, past the oil paintings of all the past mayors, to Mr Mayor’s (we had googled how to address him) office. We explained that we had a bit of a set up to do for the interview and that we need to bring in some white perpsex pyramids. The receptionist took this in her stride and told us to bring them up. Even more flustered, sweaty and rushed we then lugged three large pyramids through the mayorial offices to the board room to set up for the shoot. Although Mr Mayor had not actually seen The Wiz, he complimented us on the pyramids and told us that he liked them, even affectionately patting them as he walked past.

The questions were fielded more professionally them we may have hoped – Mr Mayor may dress with some flamboyance – but he answered like a politician. He stressed the future greatness he saw for Gary and, as Natalie from CDOP predicted, told us that he was “proud to be mayor of a tough but great city”. He saw the Megaplex as the change Gary needed – something to bring jobs, tourists, industry and investment. He explained that there were 10 millions MJ fans in America and more throughout the world and the Megaplex was going to bring them to Gary. But he very patiently answered our questions for about 40 minutes on various aspects of Gary, MJ and The Wiz.

When we got back to ReMake Estate Robert had cut loose – he had taken on the original design for the mural and made it his own – complete with the Emerald City, mountainscapes, a pond with ducks and a detailed yellow brick road.

ReMake Estate gets a visit from the fuzz

ReMake Estate got a visit from a police office today who told us “his boss” had told him to come down and check out what going on with the garden that everybody is talking about. He asked a few questions about our intentions for the house (and we allied his fears that we were planning on doing anything with the inside) and then obliged us with a photograph before taking off back to HQ. His visit must have met with some form of official approval as later on in the day we were granted an interview with the Mayor Rudy Clay at his office at 12.30pm tomorrow!

Quite a few people have started dropping by to take photographs as word is getting around that there is a new mural in town. Natalie (from CDOP) was on the radio yesterday and talked up the project sparking some curiosity about ReMake Estate. Robert has been working hard and the figure in the mural are well on their way.

Nathyn sent out a press release and there will be an article in the local newspaper The Chronicle coming out in the next few days and the project was reported in Portage Life blog.

We been busy with interviews and editing one of our stars is Kelechuwu a local poet, activist and public speaker. He gave a killer interview and recited his poem about MJ and Gary.

And very excitingly… some items have arrived from Ebay… including a signed (by MJ) copy of The Wiz script.

How does your garden grow?

Today began by meeting up with Monica who is our local gardening expert and who had agreed to be the master planner for the edible garden and who turned up with a bunch of cutting’s from her own backyard. Monica told us that there were lots of nurseries in the area so we headed off in search of a good deal for plants. While driving along a sign offering “free plants” caught our eye and we pulled over. We found ourselves in a massive nursery centre which had a greenhouse full of end-of-season veggie plants which were 25 cents a punnet. We found some amazing gems – cucumbers, peppers, watermelons, eggplants, squash, chillies, okra and jalapenos. Excited by our huge haul of veggies we set off in search of some bright flowers to add some colour. Anna was determined to get an echinacea plant – which started us on the hunt for edible flowers including chamomile and  red yarrow. We also raided the herb hothouse and got some sage, orange mint, peppermint, apple mint, chives, basil, thyme, lemon thyme and oregano. We also got some bright pink Bumblebee catchers (complete with a few bees), rhubarb, white raspberries, blue berries. With two groaning trollies of plants we made it to the checkout – only to have our plants come in over budget. After chatting with the woman who worked at the nursery about what the plants were for – she gave us a massive discount and we left with two cars stuffed full on plants.

When we got back to the house Robert from Higher Art was hard at work and a beautiful sign ReMake Estate was already gracing the front of the house. We had to dash off to do some interviews and left Duane, Monica, Anna, Jillian and Mike to plan and plant the garden.

We had arranged to meet Dawn and her two sons Treylan (10) and Terry (7) who had burned up the dance floor at the MJ Memorial. When we arrived Dawn told us the boys were up stairs and waiting to “make an entrance”. When the boys came down stairs they were two mini-Michaels – complete with a hand painted silver glove and socks. We decided to shoot in the nearby carpark and the boys told us they had chosen two solo songs each; Smooth Criminal, Wanna be Startin Something, Bad and Billie Jean – they also danced to Working Day and Night as a duo. For the next half an hour we saw some amazing moves  including moonwalking, crotch grabs, toe stands, strutting, hat throwing and spins. Their mum was on the sidelines semi-directing, semi-cheering – yelling things like “work it out, Trey” and “Build it up”.  She had told some of her family and friends about the dance film shoot and they had arrived to form a small but eager crowd of spectators.

We then drove to meet Sam’s dad for an interview – he was one of the few white people to vote for Richard Hatcher when he won the 1967 election. We couldn’t get hold of Sam to get the address – so we had to follow our instincts to find our way back to their place. We were also hampered by not knowing either his parents names so we were looking for “mum and dad” at unknown address in Merriville. A further barrier was that the area where Sam’s “mum and dad” live is full of white houses with immaculate lawns which, to us, all looked the same in a curly collection of suburban streets. After several false starts and wrong turns we managed to remember the name of their street and pull up outside their house to find Tom and Pam (as we found out their names were) entertaining some friends for a BBQ – blithly unaware that their son had scheduled an interview with us. Tom took it in his stride however and downed his beer and stepped outside for an interview. To his suprise we had in tow three white perspex pyramids which we had made up to integrate our interviews in with the Emerald City props in The Wiz. As he was pretty loosened up by the beers he had been enjoying with his friends in his backyard just previously he seemed pretty unfazed as he rather articulately answered our questions about Gary and The Wiz.

When we finally got back to the garden it looked amazing and was all in the ground. Anna tells us how it went:

“The planting was masterminded by Monica who quickly laid things out on the prepared beds and oversaw a small but willing crowd of volunteers. Robert, the airbrush guy, has a huge family (16 kids) and many of them were in attendance. Leeroy, one of his younger boys seems to be a keen gardener and took it upon himself to water in all the seedlings as they were transferred into the ground. Mike and Duane ferried water into the water reservoir by bucket from a neighbour’s tap across the road as the reservoir hasn’t had much of a chance to catch rainwater since it was installed yesterday but there were a couple of inches in the bottom of the tank this morning so we know the water catchment system functions.

The garden and mural is generating considerable interest and so we had a number of visitors during the day: Ted, a local photographer, dropped by and lined up an interview with a local newspaper, the local council building inspector checked out what was happening.”

Hay is for horses (and garden beds)

Today we had a big turn out of volunteers and interested onlookers at ReMake Estate; Jillian (with a tray of vegan nut bars) and her friend Grant came down to help, along with Zanny’s sister Anna, Salem (Temporary Services), Lora (Mess Hall), Kristie who we met at the MJ memorial and her two kids Arianna and Jayden, Nathyn, whom we met at the MJ Memorial came by and wrote a press release for the launch, a woman from CDOP, Robert and his son Robert Jnr, the airbrush guys, pitched in for a while along with Kim and Jonathan from CDOP dropping by and a range of other curious onlookers and helpers.

Luckily for us Lora bought a wheel barrow and some shovels as the hay and the soil arrived and there was much shoveling to do to lay out a range of garden beds. We were lucky too with the rain – we had asked Jimmy, the guy who lives opposite if we could water the garden beds from his tap as our rain harvester has not had time to fill up yet, but in the end it rained just as we were finishing up the biggest beds making this unnecessary. Jimmy has also kindly allowed us to us the power from his house to run a projector to show our film at the launch.

Many people came past the house curious as to its bright yellow colour and all the activity going on. Some guys came past on horses (true urban cowboys) and a big bunch of kids hung around checking out what was going on. Many flyers for the opening were handed out and by the end of the day there were five garden beds laid out and some old tires and other smaller beds filled with soil and hay. Excitingly, a simple scaffold had also gone up and work was started on the mural by Higher Art.

Higher Art or Hire Art?!

Today we meet with Robert, William and Robert Jnr from Higher Art, an airbrush company in Gary whose work we first noticed at the MJ memorial, to discuss our plans for a mural on the side of ReMake Estate. After a very serious and lengthy discussion, many photographs of each other, and an exchange of a very official looking contract they agreed to paint us a mural. The business was run by Robert, but we were particularly impressed by his 14 year old son Robert Jnr who produced some pretty lushious looking pencil drawings as he proudly showed us in his portfolio. We then discovered that he was the mastermind behind the mock up for the MJ  banner (that you could have your photo taken in front of at the memorial) and told him how impressed we were.

While much of Gary is in economic dire straights, airbrushing is a thriving economy, perhaps due to the high homicide rate. There are many R.I.P. t-shirts and banners being painted, probably some of the most common slogans they paint are along the lines of “Gone But Not Forgotten”, “Gone Too Soon” and “We Wont Forget You”.  There was even a whole box of photographs of all the people who had passed away and friends or family members had gotten custom airbrush jobs done, but not yet picked up their photographs.

Our mural is going to be their first MJ mural in Gary, which they are quite excited about – as are we. We are bringing together the “un-poisoned soup” AND The Wiz by producing a design which incorporates “Gary’s favourite son” – MJ as the scarecrow, the Tin Man (of course – it’s a Steel town after all) and the Lion serving soup.

Work on the garden starts in earnest tomorrow with a pile of hay and soil arriving ready for us to lay out the garden beds. Today Bruce, a local contractor, put a gutter on the house and connected up a 50 gallon rain harvester – so next rain we will have something to water the plants with. On Sunday Gary local, Monica is helping us plant some edible plants.

Besides the work on site at ReMake Estate, we have a hectic schedule with 11 interviews lined up over the next week including; Kelechukwu – a local poet, activist and public speaker; Jonothan – from CDOP an amazing young local activist talent; the guys who lives across from MJ’s childhood home – who were selling the bootleg merch at the Memorial; Jim Nowacki – a seemingly very vocal activist and local character; Mr Barnett aka Sam’s dad – who was one of the 1000 white people to vote for the first black Mayor of a major American city; and Kim – from CDOP among others. And inspired by the Emerald City in The Wiz, we have some new props to work with in our film…

Come to our grand opening in Gary, Indiana next Saturday!

So since our last day at ReMake Estate we’ve been plotting and planning our grand opening which is fast approaching!

Ease on down the road

Hearty lentil soup

1 onion, chopped finely
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 cup of washed, unsoaked red lentils
4 cups of vegetable stock
2 sticks celery chopped
Big handful of torn parsley
I dried morita pepper crushed
Fresh tomatoes (but we forget them so used tinned)
I red pepper chopped

Instructions

In a large saucepan, heat oil, then add crushed garlic and onion, red pepper, dried morita pepper, celery, cook until soft.
Then add lentils, four cups of vege stock and stir through. Cover and cook on a low heat. Add in fresh chopped tomatoes and parsley. Soup should thicken. Serve with a crusty roll or fresh bread of your choice.

Today we painted our house yellow with the help of Jillian who also bought delicious vegan blueberry and zucchini slice and a pile of gardening gloves and tools to donate. It was a hot day, so it was sweaty work, but after several hours we had the first coat done. When surveying our handiwork we chatted to Jimmy, the guy who lives over the road. He told us that the house had belonged to an old couple, the guy had worked in the steel mill and had died several years ago, his wife outlived him for a long time alone in the house before moving into another place and eventually dying. None of their children wanted to the house so it had become abandoned. He was pleased we were doing something with the space and told us that you “couldn’t miss that colour even at night!”.

After some deliberations we choose yellow because it is going to represent the “yellow brick road.”  We will be working on a design for the mural in the next few days which we hope to get the local airbrush crew to help us with.

Artist Talk at Mess Hall and searching for the Emerald City

On Monday we did an artist talk at the free space Mess Hall and there is nothing like having to talk about your project to help your clarify your thinking on it! In preparing for the talk we spent a few hours digesting the experience of working on the house on Sunday. William had provided us with an invaluable source of information about the existence of a “trognonomy” in Gary  and we had started to wonder how a community garden would go – how could we create a series of individual plots without fences to protect them? How could we store tools without them being stolen too? And more profoundly in a place like Gary, where even poor people have large yards and there are many empty spaces (and therefore many opportunities for community gardens) why would anyone travel to ReMake Estate to garden when they could do this in their own back yard if they wanted to? The problems in Gary are different from Sydney where community gardens can solve a real need for open space and we needed to adapt our project to these specific conditions.

We decided to change the original concept by moving away the notion of individual garden plots to a free picking garden of edible food which anyone can come by and take from when food is ripe – you can’t steal if it is free already. While we realize that the garden will not provide much food for the community the size of Gary the idea is to “sow the seeds” of growing fresh and organic food as a healthy and economical way of eating. Gary is a “food desert” with few fresh food outlets and certainly fewer  organic ones (which generally service the more middle class residents) the most common restaurants you see in Gary are fried fish and chicken joints such as Church’s, Sharks and JJs. Our edible free garden will be a very humble way of highlighting some issues concerning food distribution and production that will hopefully give some residents something to graze on as they wander by.

When thinking through some of the limitations of the garden we began to focus on the outside of the house and the possibilities for turning this space into an art project – which might have some more lasting impact and would also survive the harsh winters (when temperatures drop  to minus 30 degrees). Michael Jackson might be Gary’s favorite son but surprisingly there is no mural that we have seen to celebrate him. We decided that we would create a mural on the outside of the building.

We started researching source material wondering how to make a mural which somehow got beyond just being a fan tribute to MJ but brought together some of the issues that we felt were significant in Gary. The connection came through The Wiz a 1978 all Black satirical remake of The Wizard of Oz – starring Michael Jackson fittingly enough as the scarecrow. We were originally planning to build an MJ scarecrow for our garden but watching the movie we realised it was a prefect reflection on many aspects of life in Gary and could help bring all elements of our project together.

The film actually opens with a picture of a community mural on a wall in NY – making a great starting point for explorations of this form of expression, often associated with political and community art. We are interested in the wonderful but also sometimes corny elements of murals and The Wiz presented an interesting way into these issues.

The rusted Tin Man, who represented industrial workers in Baum’s original version of the book The Wizard of Oz, was a perfect metaphor for Gary that once had the largest steel mill in the world and that has been laying off workers leading to some of its current economic troubles. The glittering Emerald City could be a metaphor for the $300 million MJ Megaplex Rudy Clay is planning to build – will it really happen or is it just an illusion as in the movie?  The crows who keep the scarecrow on his stake through the fear that “you can’t win child, you can’t get out of the game” could be a possible metaphor for the power of gang culture and violence in a place like Gary – the twist being that the crows are saying it to Michael Jackson – who did of course did spectacularly escape the poverty of Gary (his character even says during the film “heavy lies the head that wears the crown” – an unknowing reference to his later title as the “King of Pop”). The Wiz was set in NY, which in 1978 had many empty and abandoned buildings – creating a set which looks like Gary of today. The confident pictures of an affluent Black middle class in the opening sequence of The Wiz provides a telling contrast to the racialised nature of poverty in Gary – a city whose fortunes declined after it elected the first Black mayor of a major city in the US, in 1967, leading to “white flight” and urban decay.

One of the overriding messages in the movie is that you have to “believe in yourself”. The gang of four on their journey together to see The Wiz are expecting him to grant their individual wishes and are at first crushed by the fact that he is a hoax (Richard Pryor with some animatronics) but then Dorothy points out to all of them that they already had everything they were looking for anyway – courage, intelligence and a soul. Reflecting this sentiment back to Gary we thought about Rudy Clay’s “poisoning the soup” comment once again- he insinuates that what Gary needs to “save” it is external forces, as the people of Gary would ruin the proposed fortunes of the MJ Megaplex – yet really the only thing that can transform Gary is the people themselves.

This message is also one of self-reliance, one example being how the “trogconomy” works in Gary – people have taken it upon themselves to find a way to live in amongst the scape of decaying houses and empty lots, gleaning from these structures metal, wood, glass anything that can be recycled and sold. The free food garden patch we are proposing celebrates this idea of self-reliance through opening up possibilities of  growing your own food.  In a place such as Gary where fresh food is not the norm and the fried fish and chicken joints dominate the food economy there is yet another parallel to The Wiz, where the scarecrow represents the undervalued agricultural sector.

The Wiz has opened up a rich vein of metaphors and ideas which we will be exploring through the garden, mural and the project.