In 2011, I took a press trip to Detroit. The city’s tourism office was anxious to show off the interesting aspects of the city, which are legion. One of the things that fascinated me was The Heidelberg Project, an open-air art installation on the city’s East Side. The artist, Tyree Guyton, started re-doing old houses and organizing collections of scrap materials. It has long been controversial; some neighbors thought he was junking up the area, while others thought it was an amazing way to draw attention to their community. Guyton has gone on to international renown, not least of which was an article I wrote about The Heidelberg Project for Scrap Magazine, a trade publication for the recycling industry.
An organization formed around Heidelberg, sponsoring community festivals, educational programs for children, and exhibitions throughout the world. There were ambitious plans to build a visitor’s center that would exhibit the work of other artists and employ people in the neighborhood. The plans were impressive.
This fall, three of the buildings have been destroyed by suspicious fires, the most recent one being last night.
Someone wants to destroy this project, and the city of Detroit does not have the resources to stop it. The Heidelberg Project is raising money through Indiegogo to pay for security. In contributed, and I hope it is successful.
Community economic development is hard work. People have different ideas of what is important, and there are competing interests over what kinds of jobs should be created and what sorts of public works projects should be created. But trust me: no one is going to try ANYTHING if they know their efforts may be destroyed.
This Thanksgiving, I’m grateful that I was able to see The Heidelberg Project in its glory, and I am heartbroken that it is being destroyed.
