Too Much of a Good Thing

OPENING THIS THURSDAY
(that's right, Thursday)
May 27th at MOCAD
Public opening 8 – 11PM, $6



FEATURING
The Neighborhood Machine
A mobile device that roams and wonders one Detroit neighborhood in search of evidence of what is believed to be a vast reservoir of spiritual, physical and emotional wealth waiting to be found in the back alleys, dark side streets, and abandoned backyards of the neighborhood.
The Machine will be capable of physically altering in major ways the landscape and built environment in order to find these resources. It will also act as a communicator and distributor of information, collecting never before seen images and video of these mysterious resources. While roaming the machine lays tracks that can be followed by others for reconstruction and reorganization in order to bring in the future neighborhood.

"Design 99’s work explores the edges of art practice, utilizing, design, architecture, found materials and utilitarian objects to propose creative solutions to complex problems. Their practice has at its core the belief that transformation can happen in a natural way, if we only take a look, think out-of-the-box and take action."

Too Much of a Good Thing is organized by the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and curated by Luis Croquer, Director and Chief Curator.
Show runs through July 25th
Museum hours: Wednesday – Sunday, 11 – 5PM, – 8PM on Thursday & Friday
MOCAD is located at 4454 Woodward Ave, 3 blocks south of Warren, in Detroit

Whose Banksy is it?

I've strolled through and around the former Packard Plant for several years. Met scrap traders and trash dumpers, explorers, tourists, gangs of people, gangs of dogs, seen great painted walls and lots of semi-poetic urban scrawls ("What happened to the American Dream? is the one I see by the Grand Boulevard side.) The former plant is close to a mile long--it's easy not to see everything. But keen eyes spotted a wall painting by elusive street artist Banksy--and took it (the movers are part of Detroit gallery/collective 555.) This is either in the great Detroit scrap tradition (finders keepers even if it is on private property) or its a chapter for city lore.

Here are some questions this (re)moval is provoking for me: What is street art removed from the street? Can you move it like a painting on a wall without changing the meaning of the work or the act? Is the move its own act?

Detroit Free Press on Banksy's move