BULB
The Refuge in Refuse: Homesteading Art and Culture project 2014/15
SOMArts Cultural Center, Curatorial Residency, San Francisco, CA

A Landfill in the Bay shapes a peninsula, it´s occupation by homeless locals shapes a community. The new society creates an own magical world, unreal stories and beautiful architectural inventions.
The decommissioned shoreline construction dump located in Albany, California provides home for around 40 formerly homeless residents who shaped their very own community. I am reflecting on the intersection of architecture, art and ecology, but also systems, society and the value of resources. For more than two decades graffiti artists, recreationalists and the homeless have shared the Bulb, exploring borders between public and private urban space. What evolved is a parallel world full of different subjective versions and perspectives. The local humans in their own environment and their created microcosmos is the content of interactive, photographic, sculptural, and narrative works realized in low- and high tech. The project that is still in progress is a collaboration with 3 local artists from the Bay Area.