Destination: Detroit
‘Ruin Porn’ in Detroit
by Eva Holland | 01.24.11 | 2:13 PM ET
In Guernica, John Patrick Leary takes a look at a couple of new books that depict Detroit’s empty urban landscape and ponders the broader trend they’re a part of.
So much ruin photography and ruin film aestheticizes poverty without inquiring of its origins, dramatizes spaces but never seeks out the people that inhabit and transform them, and romanticizes isolated acts of resistance without acknowledging the massive political and social forces aligned against the real transformation, and not just stubborn survival, of the city. And to see oneself portrayed in this way, as a curiosity to be lamented or studied, is jarring for any Detroiter, who is of course also an American, with all the sense of self-confidence and native-born privilege that we’re taught to associate with the United States.
(Via The Daily Dish)
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Yahoo! BuzzDavid Byrne: ‘Don’t Forget the Motor City’
by Eva Holland | 10.05.10 | 10:13 AM ET
The musician and World Hum contributor recently spent a week in Detroit, and he’s posted a lengthy, thoughtful item about the visit on his blog. Much of it focuses on the origins of Detroit’s infamous urban decay:
This is a city that still has an infrastructure, or some of it, for 2 million people, and now only 800,000 remain. One rides down majestic boulevards with only a few cars on them, past towering (often empty) skyscrapers. A few weeks ago I watched a documentary called Requiem For Detroit by British director Julian Temple, who used to be associated with the Sex Pistols. It’s a great film, available to watch on YouTube, that gives a context and history for the devastation one sees all around here. This process didn’t happen overnight, as with Katrina, but over many many decades. However the devastation is just as profound, and just as much concentrated on the lower echelons of society. Both disasters were man-made.
(Via The Daily Dish)
After Michael Jackson: Will Tourists Flock to Neverland Ranch?
by Eva Holland | 06.30.09 | 2:52 PM ET
Photo by Eva Holland Over at This Just In, the inevitable question has been asked: Where will Michael Jackson’s Graceland be? After all, the King of Pop’s fans will need a pilgrimage spot just as badly as the King’s do. JD Rinne offers a few possibilities: the Jackson family hometown of Gary, Indiana; Detroit’s Motown Museum; the Apollo Theater in Harlem; and, of course, Neverland Ranch.
The Critics: ‘Fordlandia’
by Alicia Imbody | 06.18.09 | 2:08 PM ET
Greg Grandin’s new book, Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City, analyzes the surprising history behind the brilliant car mogul’s disastrous attempts to transplant the American way of life into a remote Amazonian village. Ford is credited as the father of America’s consumer culture, but his utopian plans to capitalize on new sources of rubber resulted in one of the greatest failures of his distinguished career. The critics are chiming in on the man behind the story and the modern day implications of exporting Americanism.
Detroit’s Exquisite Decay
by Sophia Dembling | 03.13.09 | 11:47 AM ET
Time magazine’s slideshow capturing Detroit’s decay in photos by French photographers Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre is stunning and utterly heartbreaking.
My thought as I watched: As travelers/tourists we’re a powerful economic force. Can we help save Detroit?
Here are some of my previous thoughts on Detroit.
The Detroit Dilemma
by Sophia Dembling | 02.26.09 | 9:32 PM ET
A number of years ago, I worked with a woman who was originally from Detroit. She loved her hometown and missed it terribly. I can’t remember her name, but I vividly remember the glow on her face when she talked about the city she’d left behind and to which she vowed to return someday.
I know, right? Hard to believe.
Yet Detroit has a draw, even if it’s a sort of pity vote. Friend and fellow writer Margaret Littman, also has a passion for the city. She says, “I love Detroit’s architecture and public art and wide boulevards. But more than that, I love that Detroit is such a microcosm of America: boomed thanks to ingenuity and innovative and now struggling with what to do next. Plus, I’m a sucker for an underdog.”
Cuba Flights Coming to Airport ‘Within Minutes of Downtown Detroit’
by Jim Benning | 07.21.08 | 11:18 AM ET
How you Canadians tempt us poor Americans. Canada’s Sunwing Airlines has announced plans to offer flights to Cuba from Windsor, just across the border from Detroit. Company officials predict that half the passengers will be American, even though the embargo all but forbids U.S. citizens from visiting Cuba. A State Department spokesman tells The Detroit News that the trip is “risky.”
Jack White’s Poem for Detroit
by Michael Yessis | 07.07.08 | 10:33 AM ET
The singer and songwriter for The White Stripes penned Courageous Dream’s Concern in an effort to make clear that he bears no malice toward his hometown and to express the “Detroit that is in my heart. The home that encapsulates and envelops those who are truly blessed with the experience of living within its boundaries.” The Detroit Free Press has the exclusive. Lyrically, it’s no “My Doorbell” (listen below), and that’s a good thing.
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