Art Found in Unexpected Places: The Heidelberg Project
Learn about the rise and fall of Detroit and how a neighborhood art project transformed a neglected community into a peaceful form of protest and cultural destination. *This article is part one of a two-part series about The Heidelberg Project.
3600 Heidelberg St, Detroit, MI 48207No protest is as pure as the power only art can manifest. Armed with a shared outrage that certain communities across the country know all too well and an instinctual banding together of like-minds, Local Community Art can take on its own lifeforce, given the chance. And that's the right way to describe The Heidelberg Project, an outdoor art installation in one of Detroit's many abandoned neighborhoods.
The Project started in the eighties as a protest by artist and local Tyree Guyton and his grandfather, Sam Mackey. This was in response to the messy neglect that had overtaken their neighborhood in hemorrhaging Detroit. Despite its positive impact, The Heidelberg Project has faced numerous challenges over the years, including vandalism and opposition from city officials. However, the project continues to grow and evolve, drawing visitors from all over the world, and has inspired similar initiatives in other cities around the globe.
But let's pause before we get into the nearly four-decade history of The Heidelberg Project. First, we must talk about the Motor City itself. What happened to Detroit? How did it grow into an industrial juggernaut of a modern metropolis so quickly and then fall into a nearly irreparable state in less than half a decade?
The Rise and Fall of Detroit
As with many other cities in the Great Lakes region during the mid to late 19th century, the rise of Detroit seemingly happened overnight. At its height, it was the largest metropolis in the area, powered by a booming economy and innovation. Its location couldn't be more strategic, with the Detroit River directly connecting the Great Lakes to the St. Lawrence Seaway and the Atlantic Ocean, which has served as a major seaport and hub for transportation, providing access to natural resources like timber, coal, and iron ore, all of which fueled the growth of shipping and manufacturing in the region.
Then, of course, there's the auto industry. Ford's primitive Model T, Chrysler, and the behemoth General Motors paved the way to possibilities beyond anyone's wildest dreams in the area's flourishing development during this time. Detroit was the embodiment of meteoric modernization and the pinnacle of civilization, with its finger on the pulse of a new century. The city was even dubbed "The Paris of the West" for its picturesque avenues and immaculate castle mansions built during the Gilded Age. Once Thomas Edison used his new-fangled technology known as electricity to light up famous Washington Avenue, the future literally couldn't have looked brighter.
As a center of entrepreneurship, many of the world's most renowned engineers, inventors, and money chasers contributed to the wild growth of the auto industry and other technologies. With these brand-new industries emerging like colossal beasts, the fresh opportunities encouraged laborers and other folks, including entire families, to move to Detroit from across the country and the world.
Unfortunately, the utopian indulgence of the wealthy elite and an insatiable hunger for "more more more" killed the dream for everyone, especially for anyone who wasn't rich and white, like the many rural African Americans who moved north during the Great Migration.
So, What the Fuck Happened to Detroit?
Detroit's decline was a complex and multifaceted economic, social, and political process. First and foremost, the auto industry began to decline as competition increased, energy prices rose, and consumer habits changed. Racial tensions and discriminatory housing policies (look up redlining) led to "White Flight" from the city to the suburbs resulting in a significant loss of tax revenue and a hit to the city's already stagnating population. Top that shitstorm of a cake with years of greedy political corruption. Add ineffective city governance, mismanagement of funds, lack of public services, and rampant injustice, discrimination, and neglect of its own people. The Detroit citizens were basically told to go fuck themselves and that they were on their own. And it certainly was the case.
The longstanding racial tensions came to a head during the 1967 Riots. This led to dozens of deaths, thousands of arrests, and hundreds of destroyed black businesses and entire blocks of homes. The McDougall-Hunt neighborhood, where the Heidelberg Project would eventually take over the disintegrating blocks, was hit especially hard and would fall into even greater decay and dilapidation over the next several decades. Once full of new homes, young families, and hope in the city's heart, the Eastside neighborhood was left to crumble with rising crime, arson, and overall abandonment.
An Artist Returns Home
By the 1980s, Detroit was a hell of a place to be amidst the height of the [government-sanctioned] crack epidemic and its corrupt and pointless "War on Drugs," which further decimated black and other minority communities across the country. "Motor City" was now known only as "Murder City" to much of the remaining population.
Tyree Guyton, born in 1955, grew up on Heidelberg Street. After serving in the army, working as a firefighter, and pursuing a career in art, he returned to his block to find it in complete disarray and deterioration. Many neighbors had been evicted, burned out of their homes, or left for safer or, at the least, slightly less dangerous areas. Many folks left in the neighborhood were likely on drugs, impoverished, and again disregarded and neglected by their own city.
Art as Political Protest Harboring Community and Growth
Encouraged by his grandfather, Guyton was determined to do something. He began gathering the many items left by former residents and decided to turn the abandoned lots into a form of political protest via public outdoor art. He picked up a paintbrush, gathered the neighborhood kids, and started painting the leftover houses in brightly colored shapes and colors.
Eventually, the lot would include twelve houses adorned from the tip-top of the roof to the basement's foundation with children's stuffed animals, toys, and baby carriages. Discarded luggage, shoes, and basketball jerseys. Old televisions, radios, and ancient vacuum cleaners were purposely placed along the sidewalks of Heidelberg Street. Kitchen appliances, bikes, boats, and cars with trees growing out of them litter the yards. Telephone booths and Christmas decorations. Plastic Faygo pop bottles, scrap metal, and a full-on toy car pileup can still be found there.
The Heidelberg Project became an official community art fixture in 1988, two years after Guynat began the assemblage. Many people weren't sure what to think of it at first. Some folks, even those who lived there, either didn't get it or thought it looked like junk. Many folks dug it, especially the kids and other community members who helped Guyton. They shared his vision to turn what happened to Detroit and its people into a positive thing for the neighborhood and the city as a whole.
Of course, there was controversy and issues with the city government, especially as the outdoor art exhibit grew over the years. In 1991, they demolished several houses and did so again in 1999. They came out of the blue one day and gave Guyton fifteen minutes to salvage what objects he could from the homes that would be torn down. Not long afterward, between 2013 and 2014, many of the remaining houses were destroyed by incidents with arsonists. Today, only two houses remain: The Dotty Wotty House and a smaller one right next door, which still belongs to Guyton and his family.
Four Decades Later, The Time is STILL Now
In 2016, Guynat announced at the 30th anniversary that he would dismantle it to begin a new version, Heidelberg 3.0. He considers the takedown of the project an equal part of creating it, having served as the "elevator" over the last thirty-five years, knowing that one eventually needs to come back down from that elevator. He built it up. The community built it up with him; now it's time to tear it down. But he has yet to be in a rush, and once Covid-19 threw the big wrench in everyone's plans, the breakdown process seems to be on hold.
The Heidelberg Project continues to foster engagement and inspire locals to create art and transform their neighborhoods. The project also offers art classes, workshops, and other programs and resources that encourage creativity and foster a sense of community ownership. The Heidelberg Project has also gained international recognition. As an iconic cultural landmark, it's been featured in numerous publications, documentaries, and television series.
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