birgitte moos chalcraft
PEOPLE COME BACK, TRANSFORMED (forgotten neighbour).
Site-specific Pop-up Installation in Skidrow, Downtown Los Angeles
People Come Back, Transformed´s primary focus is on homeless new veterans. The project is produced as a site-specific pop-up installation, specifically placed in Skid Row Downtown L.A. An area associated with an increasing number of homeless people, settling in the streets.
The installation becomes a player in a scenario, in the sense that the installation is not an object that is seen as detached from its location. On the contrary, the installation connects, interacts with, and affects the local community, its social spaces, and people in the surrounding city. The location, spatial solution, and content of the installation are a direct response to Skid Row's development, where a link between several new veterans and rising homelessness seems to be largely ignored by society.
The intention behind People Come Back, Transformed is to have a positive impact on the development of the reality in Skid Row. To shape the future of Skid Row in real life, and to generate an understanding that there is a correlation between the psychological consequences of war and the living conditions afterward, for those who have been to war. The project further aims to reach a wider audience in order to raise a wider population's awareness of the alarming situation in Skid Row, in the hope that the homeless will receive more help and acceptance than at present.
During this project, I walked many hours in the streets of Skid Row, where I interacted with homeless veterans to become familiar with them and their personal stories.
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