The Walk, The Talk... Recent Photos from the DTES

The ideas, the issues, the actors, the users, front line workers, advocates, the developers, the abusers, safe spaces, P3's, deep affordability, at risk, area plans, zones of exclusion, the Tennant's Union, capital incubation, un-ceded, un-reported, under-funded, Tent City, high density, low market value, strata corps, City Hall, start-ups, lock-outs, community consultation, reconciliation, reno-viction, Neighbourhood Watch, B.I.A.'s, Rent-a-Cops, Pigeon Park, Pidgin Restaurant, the slum lords, the social mix, cultural capital, demo-victions, changing demographics, kinship, achieved characteristics, emotional labour, impact assessment, social enterprise, social housing, access, entitlement, poverty tourism... 

Soft Causality

Threshold

Precarious

Other Foot

Branded

Turning a Corner 

Unceded

Nobodies (MMIW)

Emotional Labour

Post-

Feedback Loop

Lived Experience

Guilty Bystander

Stakeholder

Inclusiveness

Fluid Identities

Infrastructure

Zone of Exclusion

Tech Hub (Build to Code)

Absentee Owner

On Location

Fenced In

Gauntlet

Waterfront Views

Water Is Life

Objective

Crisis? What Crisis?

Subjective

Hands Free

Intersectionality

Peak Vancouver

Climactic

The Faithful & The Ready

New Landscapes in the Republic of Property

While Vancouver continues to morph before our very eyes, the DTES still holds fast as a kind of Ground Zero, a place where the tactics of gentrification were forged and the strategies for community resistance keep getting refined. Whether its Hollywood North set dec’s turning local streets into a staging ground for the Marvel Universe, Port Authority privateers pumping more tankers and container traffic into the inner harbour or Robber Baron developers running rampant (on a field of Panama green), flipping tiny parcels of former refuge into huge chunks of change, the real owners, the people who put their lives on the line to build neighbourhood, thankfully, keep getting in the way. The view corridors may be more exclusive and the familiar landmarks harder to locate, but the big picture is still there for all to see. People, the Planet, not Profits. Here’s a few images that try and keep track of what’s really at stake.

I’m going to be away most of this summer at a residency, putting together a new project and these photos are kind of studies or sketches for some of the sculptural pieces that I’ll be working on. Notes to myself, or maybe just postcards from home.  Hope you’re all well, see you in the fall.  xs

Shoreline Erosion

Show Me the Body Politic

Blurred Lines

Scaffold

Niche Market

False Creeks

Take It Back

Demographic

Believer

Precarious

Bundle

Case Numbers

Proxy

(Un)conditional

Post-Human

Multitude

Millennial Exodus

The Best Place on Earth

Consultation

Proportional Representation

Effigy

Witness

Remediation

Economic Stratification

Lockout

Hard Times/Soft Power

Watershed Moment

Climate Refugees

Deglaciation

Habitat Loss

Walled Garden

Revitalization

Extras

Sousveillance

Brick & Mortar

Bread & Water

Diamonds and Pearls

Spillage

The Race to the Bottom

Degrowth