One More Spoke

A Sincere Offer To The New York Times

2013-03-31T23:34:00.001-04:00

Dear New York Times,
It has come to my attention that you may be in need of a few services I would be willing to provide at a very reasonable cost. Please allow me to explain. In the past 10 days you have published two articles identifying locations in Detroit as "downtown" that are not actually downtown. Then, in today's paper, you ran the following "correction:"

Correction: March 31, 2013

"A picture caption last Sunday with an article about the mood of apprehension in Detroit as the city awaited the arrival of a state-appointed emergency manager misidentified the area of the city where a police officer was shown patrolling on horseback. It was midtown Detroit, not downtown."

Actually, the officer pictured on horseback really was downtown. Unfortunately, being the "newspaper of record", you will now need to run another correction placing him there and not in midtown. If you were to read your own paper, however, you would see that the picture caption never stated where, precisely, the officer was, it only said he was "on patrol in Detroit." The photo you meant to correct (which you have done, erroneously, online but not in print) was the photo below.

Fabrizio Costantini for The New York Times

     It was this photo (published in gloomier black and white) that you identified in your print edition last Sunday simply as "downtown Detroit".
    Your correction could read something like..."A picture caption last Sunday identifying a decrepit-looking block as downtown Detroit was an attempt by the New York Times to portray downtown Detroit as a crumbling, vacant wasteland. The photo was taken in an area north of downtown and south of midtown. It is not representative of either of these two areas."
   Furthermore, just five days ago, on March 26, you published a piece about the new director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit that said the museum was "...founded seven years ago in a gritty downtown building...." I regret to inform you that this museum is also not downtown; nor could its previous incarnation necessarily be called "gritty." You did correctly identify it as a building, however.
         So, here are the services I can provide for you:

1. Identify photos or mentions of buildings as "Downtown Detroit" or "Not Downtown Detroit". I can do this for a mere $100 per item. This should be cheaper than managing all those corrections. For an additional $50 I will identify the actual location. And, for another $50, I will tell you if a photo is "representative" or "not representative" of the particular area.

2. Determine the level of "grittiness" of a given location. This will have to be done on a sliding scale, starting with "basic grit" ($75) and moving all the way to "probably the grittiest place on earth." ($1,200) I will personally investigate these areas for you and guarantee the accuracy of my grit-level assessment.

3. Determine if something is actually a building. ($200). Yes, I know you're still reveling about getting MOCAD correct but let's face it, you got lucky. The truth is, only a seasoned Detroiter can actually tell if something can still be categorized as a building or not.

Sincerely,
One More Spoke

From Sculpted Eyes

2012-06-10T14:34:00.000-04:00

Throughout the city, from bronze, marble or granite eyes, they stare, evincing triumph, boldness, wonder, or just plain stoicism. Regardless of the fact that many, in actual life, never set foot in Detroit, their likeness now inhabits a small place in it. Some have stood for over a century, their view changing with the city, but just what, exactly, are they looking at?

A pensive Hazen S. Pingree sits in his armchair high above the corner of Adams and Woodward in Grand Circus Park. He had enjoyed a commanding view of the park, staring across Woodward, beginning in 1903. Not one to sit still, Pingree repositioned his chair awhile back, apparently so he no longer had to face his rival, both in politics and in armchair statuary, William Maybury, who sits across the street. Presumably his old viewpoint was never recorded. We now know, however, that he contemplates two crosswalks while avoiding the image of his nemesis.

It is well known that the statue of Father Clement Kern has been imprisoned inside a chained fence on the corner of Trumbull and Bagley for over two decades. Intuitively his likeness does not face the unoccupied, inaccessible benches, instead he turns and pleads to those beyond the fence to unlock the gate. His gesture, if not so much the bible in his hand, says "What the hell?"

All this time without a visitor would make any view seem bleak. Staring constantly at the bars that form his cell, the statue of Father Kern no doubt ruminates on man's inhumanity to the likeness of man. Either that, or why there are so many cars driving in the new bike lane.

For true vision, however, we must look to the poets. In Detroit there are three, and as should be expected, the one with the most intense expression is Dante. Having died nearly 400 years before the founding of Detroit, his seeming look of contempt may be read as a philosophical indictment of our age, as he watches over a road on Belle Isle. Whether making the turn in front of him or proceeding straight past him, his gaze cannot really be avoided. When you approach the bust of Dante his stern look seems to be asking you to leave.

Meanwhile, to Dante's left, sits Friedrich Schiller, who has paused to contemplate something he has just read in the untitled book in his hands. Marking his page with an index finger, he turns his head to see the abandoned elevated walkway that once kept visitors to the Belle Isle Zoo out of spitting range of the alpacas. Now that the crowds have disappeared, his peaceful, musing gaze seems to make more sense; turning from the public procession that elicits scorn from Dante to look at the quiet, overgrown void that was once the zoo.

The statue of Scottish poet Robert Burns has seen a lot in over 90 years of standing in Cass Park looking north up Second Avenue. Directly in front of him he saw the Fisher Building rise on the horizon. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the Masonic Temple come into existence. Still, he keeps his arms crossed, unimpressed.

Below, Between, Beyond

2012-05-22T23:29:00.001-04:00

Over the course of Detroit's evolution, some voids have been created. They are spaces not made for people, often the result of planning executed with irreversible aplomb. Although there are many places in the city where you can experience complete solitude entirely bereft of humanity, the voids beneath the freeways are unique in their isolation. Visiting these pockets brings about a strange sense of disengagement, as though your existence has briefly ceased. You have entered a between world, it is at once hellish and serene, ultimately, however, it is the sound that leaves an impression.

Within these cavities, created as a result of a growing automobile industry, and accepted as an inevitable feature of a city reliant on such an industry, you can hear the perpetual sound of Detroit's history. It is not the usual white noise of a freeway heard from afar, or even from upon, but rather a clangorous mixture of disturbances heard from within the belly of an industrial beast. From the ceaseless procession of vehicles comes the sound of the rise of the city, the sound of its progress and dominance in manufacturing these vehicles, and also the echo of the city being transported away on the wheels of it's own creation. Occasionally a vehicle will pass overhead scrapping its exhaust system across the concrete, reverberating a question in the chamber below: "Is this what you wanted Detroit?" And then a rattling semi-truck follows with the boisterous retort: "Because this is what it's become." This sound, born here, pulsates around the globe; and in the places below the freeway you can hear, and feel, the trembling of the world emanating from, and back to, Detroit.

Claude Debussy said “Music is the space between the notes.” In other words, what you don't hear defines what you do hear. Standing below the freeway is like entering those spaces between the notes and finding a miraculous sound, one not meant to be heard. You are, after all, in a place that no longer exists, as far as the city is concerned, and yet there it is.

New Forts Of Detroit

2012-04-02T23:09:00.000-04:00

      The first thing Cadillac did when he breached the shore of Detroit in 1701 was build a fort, thus starting a tradition that continues to this day. His Fort Pontchartrain was built out of fear of the British, and technically the first building completed within the stockade fence was St. Anne's Church; either way you look at it, this makes building structures out of fear, be it of invasion or going to hell, the oldest practice in the city.
     Of course the British did come eventually and, keeping with tradition, built their own fort, Fort Lernoult, later renamed Fort Shelby by the Americans when the United States finally took it over in 1813. And like the French and British before them, the Americans felt a need to build their own fort. As a result we still have Fort Wayne, built in the mid-nineteenth century and currently sitting empty on 100 acres of land at the narrowest part of the Detroit river.
   All three of these aforementioned forts eventually had hotels named in their honor; but it's hard to imagine a future where the city's hotels will be named for our current fortifications, and not just because it's often hard to find the names of them to begin with.
Detroit is full of forts. They are accepted here as natural. The wisdom says that naturally you would make your building as secure as possible. Naturally everyone understands this, after all, would they rather have an empty building? The city is naturally thankful that there are any businesses here at all. So if you want to put a windowless facade on your building that faces a commercial street you go right ahead; we are grateful for your existence. Besides, the city has more pressing problems, but you, you are not the problem, you have come up with a solution.

The artist Gordon Matta-Clark practiced what he called Anarchitecture which involved destroying parts of buildings to expose new vistas, to allow in light where there was none. The term, in his case, was an obvious play on anarchy along with being appropriate for what he was doing as far as removing architecture. Although the new forts of Detroit could use a guy like Gordon Matta-Clark, it could be argued that these buildings are actually more worthy of the term Anarchitecture, for they are indeed without architecture.

Not all of the city's forts, however, are built with the front-less charm of a Lego block. There is another style of fort that has been in vogue for awhile. It involves sealing all the openings of an older building with brick or cinder-block, at least on the first floor, but often several stories higher. Of utmost importance for this style of fort is to not have one place where an occupant might be able to look outside. There is no need to see the invaders, their arrows will all just bounce off anyway. These forts wait for the future, unfortunately they will never know when it arrives.

According to Silas Farmer's 1884 history of Detroit, the timbers of the dismantled Fort Shelby were used to form the sides of an open sewer built through downtown in 1828. "These primitive drains offended the eye and outraged the nostrils for several years." he writes. They were so stupid back then.

Let The Statues Help

2012-02-27T23:09:00.002-05:00

Ever since General Motors decided to put their logo in blinding light atop their headquarters, the Renaissance Center, which also happens to be, for ill, Detroit's most recognizable building, it has posed a problem for those who would like to use this edificial symbol as proof of their Detroitness. Chrysler continues to release commercials with the tag line "Imported from Detroit" showing images of their new vehicles navigating the streets of Detroit in such a way that makes the Renaissance Center conspicuous in its absence.
Even for someone who quite literally represents the city, the new signs have presented a problem. Take a look at the following screenshot from U.S. congressman Hansen Clarke's website:

Two images of the GM headquarters, one with the sun's reflection obscuring the logo and the other with the logo blatantly photo-shopped away, tell us just how crucial the building is as an icon of congressman Clarke's district, a district, apparently, best viewed from another country. As a constituent of this district I would like to suggest to congressman Clarke that there are other ways of photographing the Renaissance Center without giving the appearance of an inappropriate relationship with an auto company. Plus, as an added extra additional bonus, you don't even have to leave the country.

While I'm on the subject of GM and its lighting, I would like to remind GM's head of sales and marketing, Joel Ewanick, of his quote in the New York Times back in November of 2010, where he said he was "happy the company did not go further with an alternate plan to wrap the entire top floors with electronic lighting. 'We had to stop and say, that’s too much,' he said. 'We didn’t want to look like the casinos.'"
Now that you have wrapped the entire top floors with lighting Mr. Ewanick, do you see GM going beyond the casinos in the future? Just wondering.

Color Allegiance Update From Hart Plaza

2012-02-12T16:08:00.000-05:00

If you have sworn allegiance to the periwinkle flag, your chances of having a symbol come springtime are slim. Although the representative of your color struggles bravely against the harsh February winds, it has unfortunately been torn in half. Still, as you know being a periwinkle devotee, this does not diminish the need for your color to be seen fluttering above the welcoming public space that is Hart Plaza. As someone really smart no doubt once said: "A world with tattered periwinkle is better than a world with no periwinkle." Far be it for the city of Detroit to question this theorem.

Those of you who have pledged your commitment to yellow are also at risk of losing your symbol soon. Your best hope is that your flag can survive, if only in just a handkerchief-size portion, until the dandelions arrive.

For the blue contingent, although not in the best of shape, it looks like you'll be able to last at least until the Hoedown when your most dangerous threat will be a drunken hillbilly who, out to impress his girlfriend, scales the flagpole and fashions himself a bandana that he will later be seen wearing as he challenges the Spirit of Detroit to a shirtless fight.

Finally, for the red legions out there, your flag, although a bit worse for wear, looks as though it will be presentable enough to fly here, in one of the most prominent and visited areas of the city, for at least a couple more years.

No, thank you Hart Plaza, keep up the great work, don't change a thing!

plants and birds

2012-01-21T17:43:00.001-05:00

    When I first heard about plant, a video currently being shown at the Detroit Institute of Arts, my eyes rolled so far back in my head that even a specially designed pair of 3D glasses could not render my sight operational enough to view it. But once I came to terms with the fact that someone had made a video of the abandoned Packard plant (and not, I might add, a tribute to Robert Plant and Led Zeppelin or the film "The Song Remains the Same", although parts reminded me of it I must admit) and it was now being shown in our most prestigious art establishment, I was able to relax and take from it a few pleasurable things. More than anything, it was the sound of birds.
   The birds you hear while viewing plant, a video of stitched-together photographs by Paul Kaiser and the OpenEnded Group, are essential. They are what's missing from every photo you've seen of a Detroit ruin. This is the actual, tranquil soundtrack to the empty spaces in the city; the reminder that life is still here. The most accurate description of Detroit's sound would be to compare it to an aviary. If you walk enough, through all the lonely places here, you will know this to be true.
     Yes, the video has that vast shot of the big, empty factory interior, the one that makes it look eerie and sinister. (For more of this you can go downstairs at the DIA and see it in the woefully unoriginal photographs by Andrew Moore: a photograph of an empty Ford plant taking up most of a gallery wall, even though a postage stamp would have sufficed since, yes, we get it, we got it years ago; and then one of a homeless person's camp inside the former Globe Trading building. "Do you believe where some people live?" I overheard a woman saying; apparently not realizing this is where she lives too). But beyond this typical depiction of industrial ruins, plant portrays the building as an evolving, moving, living entity in an almost organic sense, which certainly lends itself well to the title. Much of the time it looks nothing like the conventional images of the Packard plant, and instead is full of abstractions and confusing, bent light—which is actually more representational of what the real plant looks like—creating a depiction that is both oddly ancient and futuristic. Indeed, this is not a virtual tour of the plant, instead it is more of a deep-rooted feeling of what it's like to be there, which is a disorienting and tingling experience, one that is hard to recount, but this video makes a worthy attempt at conveying this feeling.
     It's good to see the DIA not shying away from the ruins, especially at a time when so many people are here for the North American International Auto Show. And although it is a bit strange to sit in an art museum and watch something that exists, "just up the street" as the DIA points out, it's even stranger when people want to ignore the ruins. Certainly most art created about ruins is worth rolling your eyes at, but not necessarily all.

If you'd like to read more about ruins, here's my most popular post ever, even though most people just look at the pictures: The Hazards Of A Post-Ruin Detroit

Top Ten Abandoned Blog-Post Ideas of 2011

2012-01-01T14:57:00.000-05:00

The second annual attempt to offer some sort of explanation as to why there are long periods of inactivity on this blog, which, despite what many seem to believe, has not itself been abandoned. As always, thanks for reading and happy new year.

1. Dave Bing's 1975-76 Basketball Card

It's almost too easy. But, even though our mayor has been reeling for awhile, it could be argued he hasn't quite fallen on his ass yet. Still, was our mayor's, and by default our city's, future foretold on a trading card back in the seventies? The implications of all this became too difficult to write about.

2. The Differences Between The Jerome P. Cavanaugh Wing At The Detroit Institute Of Arts And The Jerome P. Cavanaugh Social Room At The Lager House

This exercise was dropped because the challenge, although tempting, was much more difficult than the resulting piece's merits would warrant. I mean, who cares, right?

3. Wishing The Wish Tree Was A Willow

Yoko Ono's "Wish Tree for Detroit" may be the city's most vulnerable piece of art. Not only because a transit center was built around it but because the tree itself, a ginko, seems so fragile. I would have used a willow, but who am I to tell Yoko Ono how to do her art? Besides, I didn't want to be labeled an "arborist".

4. "In Detroit Life Is Worth Living"

I found a 100-year-old postcard bearing an image of Grand Circus Park with a floral display reading "In Detroit Life Is Worth Living". I was wondering why the Detroit Cheerleading Squad hadn't revived this saying. Personally, I was kicked off the squad for being too cynical. The best thing about my copy of this postcard is the one-sentence note on the back:

See how easy things were for Roy? He didn't have to torture his mind with questions about crime and taxes and streetlights and schools and inefficient city departments and just the overall stigma that goes with living in Detroit. All Roy needed was to be told life was worth living here. After that, there's no question where Roy's living.

5. The Center For Abandoned Letterhead

This exhibition lasted only two days back in September during the Detroit Design Festival; by the time I was able to write anything about it it was gone. This does not mean it should be forgotten, it was one of the most unique things to happen in the city all year. Set up inside the Franklin Furniture warehouse, it was the work of Maia Asshaq and Danielle Aubert and consisted of crisp, neat stacks of blank sheets of letterhead. Minimal and yet full of minutiae, the exhibit documented what the artists call "a future that never happened." This is a theme often touched upon in Detroit, but never has it been so plainly displayed as on these stark sheets of paper, in great contrast to the usual depiction of abandonment in the city.

6. eTroit

A combination of an electronic/computery version of the city and appropriating what's left by the people who call Detroit "The D." This idea became too convoluted and was scrapped because it hurt my head.

7. The Food Desert

If you told me you were going to a Sand Desert, I would think you were going to a place full of sand, not devoid of sand. So when Detroit is called a Food Desert I believe that is the correct term. That might just be me though, so I'm going to keep that idea to myself.

8. How My Extreme Displeasure For What The Ilitch Family Has Done/Is Doing/Has Not Done To Detroit Subsided For A Day Because The Tigers Won The World Series

9. The Resurrection Of David Mackenzie

I was going to write a horror-fiction piece about David Mackenzie rising from the dead and walking around the city wielding the giant boulder he's buried under and trying to smash some sense into our city officials. But this is not my genre.

10. Detroit Detroit
When you tell people that you live in Detroit, usually the first question they ask is "Detroit Detroit?" Apply this to any other city and it sounds very funny. "Chicago Chicago?" "Boston Boston?" Applied to New York it sounds especially odd: "New York New York, New York?" This seems to be strictly a Detroit phenomenon. I was going to propose the city officially change its name to reflect this, using an italicized Detroit followed by a non-stressed Detroit; but now may not be the time, the city just doesn't have the money to change all those signs. Think of all the abandoned letterhead though.

Dave Bing basketball card copyright Topps Co.

The Poignant Demolitions and Transcendent Rubble Piles of Detroit

2011-12-20T11:31:00.000-05:00

     If you live in Detroit long enough, one thing you learn is to never use a building as a signpost. For it is not uncommon for a building, any building, to disappear; sometimes seemingly overnight. As landscapes go, Detroit's shifts as much as a polar ice cap. You may not know this if you have only been following what happens here by searching for "Detroit ruins" on the internet, or looking through recent photography books, or even by visiting art museums. The eternal aspects of the photographic documentation exacerbate the legend of the city's ruins on a daily basis.
    There is indeed an understandable fascination with the decay of a once magnificent building, but when said building is demolished it continues to live on, in the minds of many, only at the most dramatic peak of its demise. This peak usually involves at least one of the following:

     —the introduction of a natural element overtaking an interior space, usually moss, foliage, water or ice.
   —an eerie reminder of the former use of the building, usually a piano (preferably toppled), medical or industrial equipment, or some sort of paperwork in massive amounts.
   —an incongruous feature which makes the whole story even more incomprehensible, something like a boat on the fourth floor of an abandoned factory.

   Mostly, however, it is the stillness depicted in these photographs that creates a false sense of what life is really like amongst the ruins. For good or ill, this an active place, the demolitions don't ever stop; and it is in the denouement where the story of any ruin becomes the most dramatic. It is dissonant, oddly sculptural, dusty, often heart-wrenching, and, sometimes, theatrically lit.

About fifteen or twenty years ago a demolition often meant an implosion. A crowd would assemble at a scheduled time (an implosion, by the way, is something you never want to be late for) the building, or buildings, would come down in a matter of seconds and, if they weren't running from a dust cloud, the people would applaud and go home. There was little time for reflection. Now the preferred method seems to be one crane operator slowly clawing away at the structure. This usually takes a few weeks for the larger buildings, and over this time the gravity of the event creates a unique set of emotions for the viewer to comprehend. But apparently, the spectacle of constant demolition is as distinct to Detroit as its now world-famous ruins. A couple years ago, while showing a visitor from Europe around, it was surprising to see him transfixed, dare I say mesmerized, because he had never seen a wrecking ball before.

Once the pendulum of a wrecking ball starts to swing, or the giant, articulating arm of a crane commences punching through the uppermost floors; it is painfully obvious at this point that arguments for preservation, restoration, or adaptive reuse are over for good. All anyone can do now is resign themselves to the reality of Detroit at this time. This resignation can be insidious, in the sense it is not evident until it has taken over; and that is the true essence of what we're dealing with here. If Detroit looks like it has been bombed, then we are witnessing the bombings, as we safely, and awkwardly, go about our lives.

After a building is reduced to rubble, the amount of gawkers and photographers walking around is greatly diminished. It is, however, an interesting period in the timeline of a demolition. Usually there is a twisted pile of metal that looks like a collision between a John Chamberlain sculpture and a Mark Di Suvero sculpture, sitting ready to be recycled. These piles are often more stunning than many painstakingly assembled art installations.

The same might be said about the jumbled rubble piles of concrete, brick and rebar. In the case of the photograph below, closer inspection reveals two columns of books appearing as integral to the structure of this former school as the construction material itself. They look as though they were purposefully placed to provoke a reaction.

Most buildings that are torn down in Detroit, it should be noted, are not high profile spectacles. Most are houses or small storefronts. Indeed, the mayor has said he wishes to tear down 10,000 structures by the end of his term in 2013. He has already overseen the destruction of 3,000 this year alone. Except for the people who live near these places, or pass by them every day, their demise usually goes unnoticed.
The photo below was taken two days ago at the corner of Franklin and Riopele. Unlike the major demolitions, which are cleaned up, their plots plowed flat in a matter of days; this building's remnants have sat here for six months. It was a quiet June morning when this two-story structure met its end. It had burned, for the last time, the night before. This particular fire had engulfed all the wooden floor joists, so there was no longer anything preventing its exterior brick walls from collapsing.

As the demolition crew went to work knocking these walls into the basement, the man from the city's building safety department and I reminisced about what a nice place it used to be. "That's what I was trying to tell these guys" he said, meaning the demolition crew. This was the Rhinoceros Club, a place that drew a racially mixed crowd, like all the best Detroit places, who would dine and drink to the sounds of someone playing the piano.
If you watch the two men on the left in the following video, you will see just how nonchalant things have become in the business of tearing down buildings here.

The Rhinoceros Club was merely this building's last incarnation. Somewhere beneath that rubble there is a carved stone that says "Troester 1911". Exactly 100 years later, that stone, which can be seen curving at the top center of the facade, now acts as a grave marker. At least until this debris is finally cleared. Most likely this corner is destined to be a vacant lot, like tens of thousands of others in the city. And like almost all those lots, what stood on them will be forgotten with time. People may always know where home plate was at the old ballpark, but no one may ever remember there was once a place on this corner where people used to relax and listen to a piano player. All the physical evidence will one day be erased, that is the reality; and reality trumps nostalgia.

RoboFlop

2011-11-25T17:27:00.000-05:00

After all the controversy, and all the hype—generated by local and national media including ABC News, National Public Radio and the New York Times—and after more than $67,000 was raised for its construction; I really thought the RoboCop statue would look a little less, I don't know...clownish?

Placement Will Be Key

2011-11-05T15:03:00.002-04:00

A few days ago, nearly an entire side of the Chase Tower in downtown Detroit was adorned with a sign. But before you are impressed by the fact that a tower can be so prodigiously draped, it should be noted that the Chase Tower is one of the shortest buildings in the vicinity and is surrounded by much larger mere buildings. Although it was built in 1959 it only gained "tower" status when Chase Bank took it over five years ago. Nothing about it says "tower". Chase Chunk would have been apter, but try telling a bank anything and you'll be reminded there is a whole 'nother view out there.

It is not the size of the sign that is so remarkable though, but rather the announcement on the sign. It states that the recently relocated Quicken Loans is welcoming "2,000 More Thinkers to 'the D'". In what is no doubt one of the greatest, and most baffling, displays of largesse the city has ever seen; Quicken Loans has apparently arranged for the casting of a great number of Auguste Rodin's famous sculpture for placement around the city. Of course, for nigh on ninety years Detroit has had just one Thinker, sitting outside the Detroit Institute of Arts. Now, apparently, we will be getting 2,000 more. Granted, this is a generous gift, though it is a bit strange for them to opt for such a large number of the same statue, even if it is by one of history's most esteemed sculptors. Certainly we could have used, say, a few more Clement Kerns outside his jail cell, an appropriately-sized Abraham Lincoln, another Fist to complete the set, some more Spirit of Detroits so at least one of them didn't have to wear a sports jersey at any given time, Hazen Pingree sitting in maybe something by Arne Jacobsen, and, although The Thinker is supposed to be Dante, a few more Dantes like the one on Belle Isle would have been nice. Oh well, 2,000 Thinkers it is. But where to put them? A few suggestions:

Certainly The Plaza of Wishful Thinking is the obvious choice for one, if not several, Thinkers.

The main library offers a perfect opportunity for a Thinker vs. Thinker Think-off. The Thinker thinking about The Thinker. It's mind-blowing.

This would be a perfect opportunity for Mike Ilitch to finally offer the city something more than gigantic plastic tigers and gigantic, revolving hockey pucks. It would harken back to the times when the 1%ers of our country actually gave something of substance back to society.

Speaking of which:

The Thinker could stand for that. Well, sit anyway.

The Bloomberg Solution

2011-07-05T22:11:00.000-04:00

    A couple months ago, on NBC's Meet The Press, New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg gave, what he called, "a good example of how you can fix some of the problems in America." "If I were the federal government," he said, "assuming you could wave a magic wand and pull everybody together, you pass a law letting immigrants come in as long as they agree to go to Detroit and live there for five or ten years."
Luckily for Bloomberg he doesn't have to become the federal government, possess a magic wand, pass a law, or even spend his time coming up with absurd plans that force people to live somewhere they may not want to be. All Michael Bloomberg needs to do in order to solve Detroit's problems is move to Detroit himself.
   According to Forbes magazine, in the last five years Bloomberg has increased his net worth by $12.8 billion (and you thought there was a recession going on) to $18.1 billion. That's a lot for a guy whose salary is only one dollar a year. If he were to move to Detroit, just for one year, and be willing to liquidate this preposterous amount of money he's made since 2006, and in turn pay 2.5% in the required Detroit city income tax for residents, it would result in a $320 million increase in the city's coffers. The current deficit of $155 million would be eliminated and turned into a $165 million surplus.
Granted, a few hundred thousand immigrants would fit in better here than one multi-billionaire, but the fact of the matter is we already have enough people looking for work in Detroit. If Bloomberg moved to Detroit, however, he could use the $12.8 billion to pay a quarter million Detroiters $50,000 each to build him a mansion the size of Manhattan. He could then abandon the mansion after a year and let it feed the local economy through the normal channels, starting with the metal scrappers and the cops who protect them, moving on through the brick scavengers, guerrilla shoppers, photographers, graffiti writers, installation artists; let's not forget all the people who will commence arguing through various newspapers, websites and blogs about what should be done with the mansion; and finally the demolition crew that will come dismantle what remains, after about 20 years of course.
Then again, if Michael Bloomberg did move to Detroit he'd probably do what most newcomers do—keep his address somewhere else so he wouldn't have to pay his city taxes or see an increase in his auto insurance rates, therefore denying him the right to vote and actually change things, but still yammer on about his great ideas for the city.

Those Things

2011-06-20T22:01:00.000-04:00

On the list of bad ideas implemented by the city of Detroit, right up there with putting freeways through neighborhoods, doing away with the streetcar system, and tearing down Tiger Stadium, is certainly the 1.2 million dollars spent to put plastic shields over 21,000 streetlight poles in an effort to prevent thieves from stealing the copper inside.
It took the thieves somewhere between two and ten seconds, depending on their intelligence, to figure out they merely had to lift the plastic shield in order to commit their crime. Not only that but, once repositioned, the shield covered the evidence of any wrong-doing, the thief could lean against the pole and smoke a cigarette if they wanted, as though nothing ever happened. Prophylactically the shields were a catastrophe.
This was all very well known at the time of their installation; and it should come as no surprise that it was during the Kilpatrick years, when the taxpayer's money was freely given to anyone the mayor wanted to enrich. Apparently he had a friend who made worthless, not to mention hideous, plastic covers for streetlight poles. Thankfully this friend did not make a similar item for abandoned houses.

The problem is, this was seven years ago. Today there are still thousands of them jokingly protecting streetlights all over town. And, as has been the case for years, you would be hard-pressed to find one fully intact. Collectively they produce a far greater eyesore than any 100-year-old abandoned Beaux-Arts train station ever could.
It wouldn't take long to remove them, instead the city seems to wait until each one slowly deteriorates and falls off. In the meantime they are a constant reminder of corruption, stupidity and waste.

Spaces That Speak

2011-06-08T23:12:00.000-04:00

Ever since the former mayor was sent to prison and his name was unceremoniously removed from the welcome sign in Hart Plaza, visitors to our city have had to settle for a greeting administered by the plaza itself. Although our new mayor has been in office for over two years, he apparently does not have the time for salutations and has handed this duty over to a group of paving stones and concrete slabs.

Well, at least this is a courteous example of pathetic fallacy, it's not like the plaza is giving you unsolicited advice, I mean, that would just be absurd. Which brings us to the curious opinions of Comerica Park.

What Comerica Park is trying to tell you with the above statement is that it does not believe you should park in Brush Park. This appears to be the beginning of a feud between the adjacent parks and it will be interesting to hear how Brush Park responds. It should be noted that Comerica Park's suggestions work to the advantage of Mike Ilitch, who operates Comerica Park and no doubt has its ear, due to the fact he owns several parking lots west of the Fox theatre. Thankfully, most people know Comerica Park is just a crackpot. But, if open spaces are going to give us their opinions, I for one would love to hear Belle Isle's thoughts on littering.

Oblique Chunks

2011-05-31T19:19:00.000-04:00

In the mid-1960s, two Frenchmen, the architect Claude Parent and the cultural theorist Paul Virilio, came up with the theory of the function of the oblique. It was an attempt to do away with both the vertical and, ideally, the horizontal in architecture. Writing in the Canadian journal Topia, Steve Redhead put it this way: "The work the two did together envisaged a new post-architectural and urban future that would force the body to adapt to disequilibrium and promote fluid, continuous movement. It was bred in the context of utopian impulses in the 1950s and 1960s as a reaction to the stultifying orthodoxy and results of the earlier modern movement in art and architecture." With his provocative designs, Parent has admitted to seeking a form of architecture which is "not rooted in the ground," but rather "erupting from it." He has also sought to design structures that "appeared to be toppling over." As Redhead puts it: "The drawings and models of Parent always had the potential for media notoriety, constituting almost a "punk architecture." Like his one-time employer Le Corbusier, Parent's preferred building material is concrete.

Virilio is probably best known for his 1975 book "Bunker Archeology" where he attempts to come to terms with the discarded German bunkers littering the French Atlantic coastline after World War II; describing them "as though a subterranean civilization had sprung up from the ground." Parent has described the bunkers as "having a sense of movement, if you look at them for long enough, they seem to be advancing towards you—like tanks."

It may be a stretch to say William Kessler was thinking about any of this when he designed Detroit Receiving Hospital, which was completed in 1979. The hospital itself, with its gurney-like cladding and bold but judicious use of color, reflects Kessler's departure from traditional modernism—despite his training under the Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius. This was, after-all, the seventies. It stands today as one of the city's most striking buildings.

But it is around back, hidden from the street and approachable only by foot or on bicycle, where the monolithic oblique chunks can be found. They may not quite be what Parent and Virilio were talking about, but their existence is definitely an oddity which constitutes one of Detroit's most unique landscapes.

Their purposes are not always evident, some hum like air conditioners or ventilators, others appear to be skylights, the windows of which glow at night. Others obviously contain stairwells, but some appear as though they are just strange portals to another world.

In daylight they cast sharpened shadows, while at night, particularly in the rain, they stand like ghostly relics from a curious time. Why they aren't icons of the city I have no idea.

(Don't Tell The Trees)

2011-05-26T21:28:00.000-04:00

They plink sad songs on the piano

and tell stories about the past.

They say Detroit is dead

and it isn't coming back.

Funny then, how the seasons keep changing here.

Fake Gordon Newton Engulfs Federal Building

2011-05-08T19:16:00.000-04:00

In an ideal world the government would have commissioned Detroit artist Gordon Newton to install a piece outside the Federal building while it underwent renovations. Instead they only built a cheap imitation of something he may have done. For the real thing we will have to hope for another work outside the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit; his second of which has just been taken down and was a far better commentary on current building trends than I could have wished for with my previous post.

Outskirt Architecture In The Heart Of The City

2011-05-01T12:28:00.000-04:00

Architects do not have an equivalent to the medical doctor's Hippocratic oath. As a result, society is at the mercy of the most unscrupulous wielders of the draftsman's pencil. (For an all-too-glaring example of this you need only turn to the statue of Hippocrates in the Detroit Medical Center. It is standing in front of a Wayne State University medical science hall with windows the size of those usually reserved for prisons). Although we can certainly look to developers, and several governmental departments, when it comes to who is culpable for subjecting us to the excruciating blandness of strictly-for-profit architecture, in the end an architect is needed to draw up the plans. Lacking such an ethical code, architects are free to design buildings which do not take into consideration the well-being of the community. They can disregard aesthetics, scale, the neighbors, challenging design, a structure's relationship to the street and, most importantly for an urban environment, the contribution toward the overall function of the city; basically, everything we're told they are taught in architecture school. It's like if you had the option of choosing a doctor who would remove your appendix with a rusty nail.
If you drive outside Detroit, beyond the suburbs, to the outskirts and what might be called exurbia, you will inevitably pass a cluster of identical residential buildings sitting in the middle of a field. They are typically deemed "estates" and will be distinguished by their multiple gables. (Apparently there is a school of architects who view the gable as the most important architectural element). They will also often feature a balcony so their inhabitants can look out onto the freeway, or across a parking lot onto their neighbors balcony. Their materials will exude cheapness and their color will be a safe taupe, the color of everyone's dreams. These places do a wonderful job of providing their residents with exactly what they're looking for when it comes to housing: a place to watch TV.

A taupe gable, ready to offend

Passing such enclaves on the freeway used to make you even more thankful for the varied architecture of Detroit. Unfortunately the dullness, sameness, and terrifying taupeness of this outskirt architecture has actually been proliferating in the city. The photograph at the top of this post shows the beginnings of the Cornerstone Estates. It is being built on the site of the former Jefferies East housing projects and will eventually comprise 60 buildings. The developer is Scripps Park Associates, the same people who brought us the extremely uninspiring Woodbridge Estates. (photo below).

       But who is the architect of the Cornerstone Estates? Well, they're Progressive Associates Inc.of Bloomfield Hills, and if the name alone doesn't inspire you to hire them for your next project, perhaps you should check out the dazzling website of Progressive Associates Inc. It is a great example of what websites looked like in the 20th century. Indeed, it was last updated 12 years ago despite their request at the bottom of the page to "Come visit us again soon, our website is always growing!" They also note that they are able to provide their services "by emphasizing creative design."
    Let's face it, Pro. Ass. Inc's "creative designs" have grown as much as their website has in the last 12 years. They probably drew up the plans for these monstrosities at least twenty years ago; and except for the day in 1999 when they put up their one page website, they've most likely been out on a golf course while large checks are deposited into their bank accounts; some, like those for the Cornerstone Estates project, compliments of you and me, whose federal tax dollars are funding this. Don't believe for a minute that the best interests of the community were taken into account when it was decided that the residents of Detroit will have to look at these thoughtless chunks of garbage for decades to come.
    The Detroit Housing Commission says that this "site configuration is designed to fit seamlessly into the fabric of the surrounding neighborhoods." As a resident of the city you should read this to mean you will train yourself to skirt around the perimeter of this development like a rat in a Skinner box.
Two days ago Mayor Bing presided over the demolition of the 3,000th home in Detroit, on his way to reaching his goal of 10,000 by 2013. He was quoted in the Detroit News saying: "For those of you who live in this neighborhood, this is an eyesore. It's things like this that bring our neighborhoods down." It's good to know the mayor is cognizant of the effects of eyesores on a neighborhood. Unfortunately for him, his list of structures which need demolishing for this reason is about to get longer once the Cornerstone Estates are finished. And while he's at it he can add the latest foray into student housing by Wayne State to the list also:

Detroit In Books, Part 2—Henry Miller's The Air-Conditioned Nightmare

2011-04-16T22:54:00.000-04:00

     Henry Miller's The Air-Conditioned Nightmare contains what is perhaps the most prescient observation ever written about the city of Detroit. Stopping here in 1940 on a cross-country trip, in an automobile he had only just learned how to drive, Miller wrote: "The capital of the new planet—the one, I mean, which will kill itself off—is of course Detroit. I realized that the moment I arrived."   To show you just how prescient this was, here's what Metro Times columnist Jack Lessenberry said just a couple of weeks ago about the city a decade after Miller arrived: "Everyone thought the good times would go on forever. Nobody, but nobody in 1951, could have imagined the picture of sheer urban devastation that is today's Detroit." Nobody, that is, except maybe those who read Miller's book, which was published in 1945.
Miller doesn't expound too much on the matter, seemingly because he deems it too obvious, believing everyone will eventually see what he sees. He does go on to say: "You wouldn't suspect that there was such a thing as a soul if you went to Detroit. Everything is too new, too slick, too bright, too ruthless. Souls don't grow in factories. Souls are killed in factories—even the niggardly ones." Those are some harsh words, written long before all the usual examples given for why Detroit has come to be what it is today. Miller wasn't predicting freeways to the suburbs, or the rise of the Japanese auto-industry, or the devastating effects of poor race relations. It was the subjugation of the workforce and the rampant greed he found so abhorrent and stifling.
Miller stayed at The Detroiter Hotel on Woodward. (It is now the sight of frownhouses, which are frown-inducing townhouses). He calls the hotel "the Mecca of the futilitarian salesman," and mentions the "swanky haberdashery shop in the lobby," where the salesmen buy silk shirts and "any and everything—just to keep money in circulation."
    After spending the previous decade in Europe, Miller is prepared to complain about nearly everything he sees throughout his trip, it isn't all reserved for Detroit, where he also takes issue with the cold, windy weather and says the "buildings are straight and cruel." "Detroit isn't the worst place—not by a long shot," he says, "there is no worse or worstest. The worst is in process of becoming." Assuming this is still true, maybe we should be thankful that Detroit has dropped out of the process.

Burying The Past

2011-04-03T23:14:00.001-04:00

The Buildings of Detroit website is a valuable source of information when it comes to the architectural history of the city. The name, however, is a bit of a misnomer; it should actually be called "The Buildings Of Detroit Prior To 1930, Except For The Unusual Inclusion Of An Architecturally Insignificant Tiki Restaurant From 1967" I point this out, not to disparage its authors who, I'm certain, work very hard to update the site and do an excellent job, especially with their vigilance in keeping an eye on and documenting many of the endangered buildings in the city; but rather as an example of what seems to be a prevailing attitude toward architecture of more recent vintage. Which is to say, basically, no one cares. This is why the city's decision last month to tear down the Ford Auditorium, built in 1955, elicited a barely audible cry of dissent, and that is unfortunate.

The recent announcement of Detroit's census figures, showing a 25% population decrease in the last decade alone, has brought back wistful memories of the city in the 1950s when the population was more than two and a half times what it is today. Oddly enough, these memories don't usually recall what was being built in the city at the time. Reverential thoughts are reserved instead for the theaters, skyscrapers and office buildings of the 1920s or earlier. This is akin to ignoring the Ford Thunderbird and pining for the days of the Model A. But if you really want an idea of where the city was headed at the time of its population peak, the best place to look is the area around the Ford Auditorium. You must be careful, however, because a lot of what you see was pieced-in later; the most obvious being that looming jerk which is the Renaissance Center.

The auditorium anchors the eastern edge of what no one calls the Civic Center. Yes, you can follow freeway exits to the Civic Center, but if you ask anyone on the street to point you toward the Civic Center, most likely they won't know what you're talking about. The Civic Center was an idea put forth by the Mayor-ahead-of- his-time, Hazen S. Pingree, in 1890. Freeway signs notwithstanding, this idea has yet to come to fruition. This, despite attempts in 1924 by Eliel Saarinen and again, along with his son Eero in 1947, to design a master plan for the area at the foot of Woodward Avenue. The 1947 model called for a Veterans Memorial Building which was built in 1951, a City-County building, rendered in a much different style than the Saarinen's proposed, in 1955, and a circular venue which was realized in the form of Cobo Hall in 1960, along with the Ford Auditorium, which can be seen toward the right in a photograph of the plan below. It is facing west instead of the orientation in which it was finally built, turned 90 degrees clockwise.

    Standing in the Civic Center today, in what became Hart Plaza, some things compliment the auditorium's modern, austere aesthetic while others undoubtedly do not. Isamu Noguchi's 120 foot tall "Pylon" does, if not so much his Dodge fountain. To the north, two of downtown's best examples of Detroit's march into the gleaming future, Minoru Yamasaki's Consolidated Gas Company Building (now One Woodward Avenue) from 1963 and the aforementioned City-County Building (now the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center) from 1955, provide an inkling of what direction the city was headed. This is the city everyone was so excited about by the time the space age came around. This is the city of 1.85 million people.
     The main thing missing from the plan today, however, is greenery. Visiting Hart Plaza you get the sense you are walking on a giant, multi-tiered wedding cake made from concrete. All this concrete mixed with an absurd number of light poles, security cameras, useless signs, meaningless solid-color flags, and various odd vents coming out of the ground, make the Ford Auditorium look like it was left behind in the parking lot of a mall. This is quite an indignity for a building which was actually designed to be appealing, its exterior made from Swedish blue pearl granite and marble.
    It's setting is all wrong now though, its clean lines and simple cubic mass are obscured by all that has gone on around it in the name of progress; to the point where now it is looked upon as the problem. It seems the place never really got its due. First it was positioned wrong, then it was dwarfed by an obnoxious neighbor and finally it was surrounded by adjunct junk. The place deserves another chance, which is why I'm proposing the city carry on its grand tradition of moving buildings and transport it to one of the vast empty lots on the east side, where it could be surrounded by thoughtful landscaping and unencumbered so its true beauty could finally be revealed.
The sad thing about Mayor Bing's decision, and the city council's approval, to demolish the building is that Bing would like to build an amphitheater on the site. I believe he's just saying this so it appears he has a plan, because normally when the city tears something down they decide what to do with the land after the fact, but I'll call his bluff on this one.
    So, Mayor Bing, what you're saying is, this year-round music venue is standing in the way of you building a music venue which could only be used a few months out of the year? Beside the obvious, there is another serious problem with this plan and I know, Mr. Mayor, you only moved to the city so you could run it, so maybe you're unfamiliar, but there already is an amphitheater on the river. It's within walking distance from downtown for any able-bodied person and it's called Chene Park. How about that, you've already got what you wanted? While I have your ear though I'm going to give you one more idea, assuming you're intent to go forth with demolition and you find my proposal for moving the building unfeasible. (As with all the ideas I've set forth in this blog I expect to not hear from your office once again, so the pressure is really off.).
   As others have said, if the Ford Auditorium is demolished the space should revert back to a public green space. But if this is the case, why tear down the building? Why not just bury it? Done properly, elements of the auditorium, particularly its vertical expanses of blue granite, could be left exposed. Meanwhile the roof, covered in grass and approached by a sloped lawn would provide downtown with a nice terraced vantage point. The other good thing about this plan is, not only would it be cheaper, but if fifty or a hundred years from now they realize it was a mistake to tear down such an amazing example of mid-twentieth century architecture they can simply dig it back up.

    Photograph of 1947 Detroit Civic Center model by Harvey Croze from the Cranbrook Archives.

Statue Darwinism

2011-02-19T20:53:00.003-05:00

Sometimes it's hard to predict which statues will prevail. As a bust of Abe Lincoln sits with a broken nose down by the river (and suspiciously near a giant fist); over $60,000 has been raised, in just over a week, to construct a statue of Robocop in Detroit. And although most of the arguments, for and against, have already been made, and the story has been covered by everyone from NPR to the New York Times —who found the importance of the story so crucial they placed it on the first page of the National section and, apparently, felt the piece stood up well enough on its own that they were able to write an entire article about something happening in Detroit without mentioning Phil Cooley—I am conscious of the fact I may lose my blogging license if I don't weigh-in on the subject.

One of the arguments against the Robocop statue is that it's too lowbrow and kitschy. This is true, as most of the support seems to have come from nerds, who are not known for their aesthetic proclivities, but without whom I would not be typing on this laptop and you would not be reading this on whatever nerd-developed device you are using. It is therefore imperative we keep the nerds happy.
If you look at the evolution of statuary in Detroit, which includes two, hundred-year-old bronzes of men sitting in upholstered, fringed chairs, (you mean to tell me this wasn't controversial, to have a statue sitting outdoors as if in a parlor)? To the current most popular statue in the city which, it may surprise people to hear, is a gigantic tiger, made to look like concrete but actually feels and resonates like plastic, sitting outside the baseball stadium. It doesn't get more lowbrow and kitschy than this tiger—which is what we've come to expect from the Ilitch family—except when the statue is swathed in a giant Carhartt jacket every winter. Still, there is rarely a time when you'll pass by this statue and not see someone posing for a picture in front of it.

     Marshall Frederick's Spirit of Detroit is obviously a much classier and impressive statue compared to the tiger, but let it be known that its popularity goes up when it too is clad in clothing, usually a hockey jersey. (Ilitch again!) The point is, even if money were raised to erect a more, shall we say, "artistic" statue, there's no guarantee it would not be dumbed-down in the future. Unfortunately, if you take issue with silly statuary, you have a long way to go before it's eradicated in Detroit.
This would be a good time for the designers of the new Robocop statue to take note. If you want your statue to be even more popular, design it so it can wear clothing. An arms akimbo stance should be avoided. You never know when an advertiser, a sports championship or even a worthy cause may present itself and Robocop would need to put on a shirt or jacket to show his allegiance. I do not, however, recommend having Robocop sitting in a chair, that would make him look lazy.
The other main argument against the Robocop statue is that it's a waste of money, and $60,000 could be spent on more noble things, like helping the poor in Detroit. This is also true, and unfortunately always will be. Carhartt could also have made 20 coats for 20 homeless people but instead they made one coat for a giant plastic tiger and no one said a thing. But instead of listing the other 50 trillion things that someone spent money on that could have gone to a greater cause I would like to bring your attention (once again) to another Detroit statue that ended up being a big waste of money but can now, miraculously, be saved by Robocop.
    Father Clement Kern spent his life helping the poor in Corktown. After his death he was honored with a statue in a small park on the corner of Bagley and Trumbull. We'll never know if Kern would have deemed the expenditure for his likeness cast in bronze as a waste of money, but apparently no one complained or saw the irony of this at the time. The sad part, however, is that this statue and the eight benches set in front of it, has been behind a locked, iron fence for over two decades, denying anyone the chance to enter the park and spend time with the statue, be it for contemplation, photographing or to add extra clothing to it.
    This presents a perfect opportunity for the makers of the Robocop statue to appease the critics. It is quite obvious that the fence surrounding Father Kern must be removed, melted down and used in the manufacturing of Robocop. Statues helping statues, isn't that what Detroit's all about?

The Mountains Of Detroit

2011-02-16T22:54:00.000-05:00

We know that nature is slowly reclaiming Detroit. We know about the grasslands, the vine-entwined homes, the trees growing from the tops of buildings. We know about the falcons and the pheasants and the foxes. But no one seems to be talking about the mountains. We have reached an exciting epoch in the evolution of Detroit's landscape—the city isn't shrinking, it's growing.
Now, you're probably thinking mountains can only be formed by some sort of volcanic eruption or continental collision or something to do with tectonic plates shifting. And yes, you'd be right, however, it takes a more advanced and forward-thinking geologist to acknowledge the formation of mountains caused by lesser acts, like say, freeway construction. Regardless, the Oxford English Dictionary defines a mountain as "a natural elevation of the earth surface rising more or less abruptly from the surrounding level and attaining an altitude which, relatively to the adjacent elevation, is impressive or notable." Not one to argue with the Oxford English Dictionary and, being a true flatlander, I find Mount 23rd Street (above) to be both impressive and notable. It is best viewed just before the Vernor exit heading south on Interstate 75. The view pictured, however, is of the eroding southern side which is prone to avalanches.
In the same range you'll also find Mount 20th Street (below), an alpine wonder of magnificent beauty. This is the more difficult to reach, and therefore less touristy, of the two. It's tucked away off a secluded, unpaved (by that I mean brick) road and the peaceful mountain pass which is 20th street, just before it dips into the tunnel (by that I mean viaduct).

Over on the east side, in the old warehouse district, you'll find a mountain which has been forming for a few years now. It started as a soft gravel pile gleaming in the eye of a developer, until inactivity caused by the poor economy resulted in its exposure to too many rainstorms, which caused clumpification. This was followed by the rooting of hardy vegetation which now gives it a wild, Ozark-like appearance. It is called Nevermind Mountain. If it keeps growing like it has been, this could be the peak that finally gets Detroit's mountains noticed in a few years, bringing in those untapped ecotourist dollars. Keep an eye on it.

    Unfortunately, although it should not come as a surprise, all these mountains have a fence around them; which might make people reading this in Nevada or Colorado scratch their heads in wonder, but around here it is necessary. As I've already explained in a previous post, a foreign casino stole our sky, so it would not be out of the question for them to take our mountains too. Right now the fences are protecting these young mountains until they have grown to a safer, unstealable, size.
    There is good news though for the urban mountain climber. Possibly the city's largest mountain, Mount Atwater, just southwest of Nevermind Mountain, doesn't have a fence around it (well, not a very good fence anyway) and can be climbed at any time. When I scaled it last weekend, with the help of only two Sherpas, the summit held a most unusual surprise. Although the rest of the city had about a foot of snow on the ground, the flat top of Mount Atwater was mostly grass. This is obviously the opposite of regular mountain behavior and, I believe, means it is either radioactive, or it is the redoubt of an evil scientist, or it is actually a volcano. There is also a slight possibility that it is merely a mystery spot. I'm leaning toward volcano.
    The reason to climb Mt. Atwater of course, is for the view. If you make it all the way to the top (don't listen to the Sherpas when they say you should turn back) you'll be about 60 feet higher than you were when you started. That might not seem like a lot, but remember, Detroit is only about 600 feet above sea level to begin with; so you've actually increased your altitude by 10%. To put this in mountainous terms, it's like taking Michigan's tallest mountain, the mighty Mount Arvon at 1,979 feet, and putting it on top of Mt. McKinley.
   Be careful though; while standing above the treeline and looking down into the valley that is Detroit, altitude delirium can wreak havoc on the mind. For a moment I thought I saw two larger peaks off to the east; then I realized it was just the Chene Park amphitheater and I came to my senses. I mean, I know a mountain when I see one.

Lafayette Park Now More Minimal

2011-02-13T17:38:00.002-05:00

    It's hard to believe, but Mies van der Rohe's Lafayette Park residential development now has less, I mean more, to it. Just when you thought, after 55 years, that its lines could not be made cleaner, a recent change has actually accomplished this unfathomable refinement.
As I wrote one year ago this week, there was a mysterious cable strung between the two iconic towers of Detroit's Lafayette Park. This cable has now vanished as enigmatically as it existed, leaving us with what may have been Mies' ultimate vision — two free-standing buildings, untethered to each other, with a vast, angular negative space between.
    As I stated in the earlier post, I was content to let the reason for the existence of the cable remain a mystery and I still am, however, it seems clear now that the cable's function may have become outdated in today's world. Which means our modern age has made the most modernist of architects even more modern.
    As I also said, the cable was hard to capture in photographs. Below you will see it stretched from the center of the eastern tower in an older picture. (click photos to enlarge).

Today, however, it is not to be seen:

Minimalism at last.

Detroit In Books, Part I—Roberto Bolaño's 2666

2011-01-30T17:32:00.000-05:00

The first in a, most likely, annoyingly sporadic series about the portrayal of Detroit in literature and other published works.

    Detroit, despite being founded 310 years ago, and in this time offering up plenty of accessible metaphors and ironies for its millions of inhabitants who came from all parts of the world, each one a character and each with a tale to tell; has oddly enough never produced one great novelist, resulting, of course, in untold untold stories. Yes, there are the crime novelists Elmore Leonard and Donald Goines, but when it comes to literary fiction Detroit's preeminent voice is nowhere to be found.   Speculatively, Joyce Carol Oates could have taken this mantle had she continued to live in the city and write 7,000 books about it, instead of leaving some 40-odd years ago and writing 7,000 books about other things. There are also those who would give the title, by default it seems, to Jeffery Eugenides based solely on his second (and most recent) novel Middlesex which won the Pulitzer prize in 2003. I'm going to go out on a limb though and predict there will never be a statue of Jeffery Eugenides in Detroit.
So, given the dearth of Detroit literary novels, you'd think it would be a welcome development when Roberto Bolaño, a Chilean writer seemingly destine for a Nobel Prize had he not passed away so unjustly at the age of 50, chose to use Detroit as a setting in his near-universally acclaimed final novel 2666. Unfortunately it is not a welcome development, but a peculiar, cringe-inducing episode.
The Detroit part of this 900-page book is only 22 pages long, and comes as a surprise after Bolaño has deftly taken the reader through several parts of Europe. I don't know for certain that Bolaño never came to Detroit, but based on his brief description of the city it seems quite evident he did not. And yes, this is quibbling, and no, it doesn't really affect anything in the large scheme of things, but it just would have been nice if there were a greater amount of verisimilitude.
    In the novel, a reporter for a New York-based magazine called Black Dawn, Oscar Fate, is sent to Detroit to interview one of the founders of the Black Panthers, a man named Barry Seaman. Seaman's neighborhood is described as follows: "The neighborhood looked like a neighborhood of Ford and General Motors retirees. As he walked he looked at the buildings, five and six stories high, and all he saw were old people sitting on the stoops or leaning out the windows smoking." Later, when Seaman is giving a speech in a church, he describes California for the benefit of his Detroit audience like this: "People live in houses not apartment buildings, he said, and then he embarked on a comparison of houses (one-story, at most two-story), and four- or five-story buildings where the elevator is broken one day and out of order the next."
    The problem here, of course, is that Detroit is primarily a city of houses and not apartment buildings; and one of the fundamental aspects of the city is that autoworkers, not just those from Ford and GM but also those who worked for Chrysler, were able to buy their own homes. Neighborhoods full of apartment buildings, the way Bolaño describes them, don't really exist in Detroit.
    Bolaño's writing often fluctuates between the real and the imagined, between the conscious and unconscious, he plays a lot with our sense of reality, and it is often his intent to keep the reader guessing it seems. But the Detroit part of 2666 is confusing for its odd attempts at exactness, like when he calls it the "Detroit-Wayne County airport" which isn't what anyone calls it, or when the Oscar Fate character "...headed down Woodward Avenue and checked out the downtown. He had a cup of coffee and toast for breakfast at a Greektown diner." And that's it, that's as descriptive as Bolaño gets when it comes to downtown, as though his information was gleaned from an in-flight magazine.
    The book moves from Detroit to Mexico, to the most memorable section of the novel, "The Part About The Crimes." After reading this part, with it's gruesome descriptions of hundreds of murdered women and girls, you'll wish it had stayed in Detroit; but the truth is the Detroit part is quickly and easily forgotten.

The Dead Of Winter

2011-01-22T17:05:00.000-05:00