DETROIT BUSINESS MAIN 07-16-07 A 22,23 CDB 7/12/2007 4:33 PM Page 2 July 16, 2007 CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS Page 23 FOCUS:WOODWARD AT 200 Culture The urge to create Architects Art community 66 Brian Hurtienne Crain’s has compiled a list of emerging and established Detroit Detroit historic architect Bri- but they are still a box,” Hurti- artists to watch. The list was devel- an Hurtienne is pleased several enne said. oped by talking to art insiders and of downtown Detroit’s stately old Getting interesting buildings aficionados and through Internet buildings are being renovated. requires enlightened developers. research. He is happy to have worked on Why is Detroit architecture so One art insider said there’s a some of those projects, and is safe? “Economic and social con- problem with trying to name very looking forward ditions here talented and successful Detroit to completing make the safety artists, because very talented more. But he is factor more artists generally choose to leave De- still waiting to see prevalent than troit to advance their careers. Still, some standout ar- in any other big quite a few of them still hang their chitecture in the city,” he said. In hat here, at least part of the time. city. the 1950s, when Think Frank the auto indus- Britton Tolliver: Born in John- Gehry’s Guggen- try was at its 67 son City, Tenn., this painter is heim Museum Bil- peak, Detroit based in Pontiac and is a graduate bao in Spain or was an innova- of the Cranbrook Academy of Art. His Santiago Calatra- tor in architec- work has exhibited throughout the va’s Milwaukee Art ture with the country and Canada. Museum. likes of Minoru “Detroit needs Yamasaki, Eero 68 Lowell Boileau: Known world- something that is Saarinen and wide for his “Fabulous Ruins not typical or just others creating of Detroit” Web site, now called detroityes.com, Boileau is a self- DON KUREK a box. Good archi- one-of-a-kind Scott Hocking creates art from found objects to find ‘beauty in the city.’ tecture brings “The nails in the projects such as taught painter and Web artist. heightened Temple Beth-El 69 Mary Kim: This Cranbrook Scott Hocking awareness of coffin came when and the GM Tech Academy of Art graduate and things happening Center. instructor at the College for Creative ike Woodward Avenue and the city of Detroit, Detroit artist in the city. It cre- “The nails in Studies is known for her colorful Scott Hocking is in transition. ates conversation John Porter designed the coffin came L Known for his “found-object” art installations comprised of sculptures and painted pieces. and causes cu- when John items he finds on Detroit’s gritty streets and in abandoned buildings, the Renaissance Mike Richison riosity,” he said. Porter designed 70 : With a master the 32-year-old is exploring other art forms, particularly photography. Hurtienne said the Renaissance of fine arts from Cranbrook, His subject is still Detroit, only this time he is chronicling people in the new transit Center, which was Center, which Richison is a printmaker, painter their city environs. His knowledge of the city fuels his projects. station being was just like the and sculptor. His work has been “I come from here. I have a good visual memory and have a map of built at Michigan just like the three or three or so oth- exhibited in Detroit and other the city in my head,” he said. and Cass avenues ers he designed parts of Michigan as well as Sioux Hocking’s wall-size installations of found Detroit objects were fea- downtown so others he designed before it.” City, Iowa, and Berlin. tured at the Detroit Institute of Arts during the city’s 300th anniversary celebration. The installation comprised 400 16 inch-by-16-inch wood broaches on inter- Hurtienne, 47, Scott Hocking: (See story, this Ernst & Young esting. It will before it.” an architect 71 page.) boxes, each one containing a different object. He said have white Brian Hurtienne with Hamilton bought an 18-box installation for its downtown office. “I’ve sold about canopies similar Anderson in De- Clint Snider: He paints primari- 100 boxes,” he adds. “They have had a lot of momentum.” to Chene Park. But Hamilton Anderson troit’s Harmonie 72 ly bleak Detroit scenes on He also frames some of the objects — from pieces of rusting metal to he hopes to see Park since April, large pieces of wood he has found in a porthole mounted on wood. even more no- opened his own the city. He had an installation at He took a detour last year with his exhibit at the Susanne Hilberry table architecture. “Especially company, BVH Architecture Inc., in the Detroit Institute of Arts with Scott Gallery in Ferndale. His work consisted of colorfully painted and some- with the new riverfront projects the late 1990s. His firm was the Hocking for the city’s tricentennial. what disfigured glass-fiber animals, which he said he did to show his being planned,” he said. architect for the high-profile disgust for the trend of using painted animals as public art for city “The Ellington Lofts are nice, Kales Building, an 18-story apart- Richard Lewis: Lewis was born 73 in 1966 in Detroit. He is a streets. “They dumb down what art could be,” he said. “I also have ment building at Adams and this compassion for animal life and wanted to bring attention to (ani- Park streets that cost $17 million graduate of Cass Technical High School and earned his bachelor of mal cruelty).” to renovate. His giraffe in the show had a bloody gash where the tail should be to He said the beauty of the Kales fine arts from the College of Cre- ative Studies and a master of fine showcase that in many African cultures giraffes are poached and along with its underground tun- their tails are used for good-luck trinkets, fly whisks and thread for nel to parking under Grand Circus arts from the Yale School of Art. sewing or stringing beads. In the exhibit, the tail laid on the floor in a Park makes it an appealing resi- Lewis is a realist painter and has pool of fake blood. dence. He cited parking as an im- taught at Oakland University, CCS Hocking, a native of Redford Township, lives and works in his stu- portant aspect to making housing and the Yale School of Art. dio — a nondescript brick building off Grand Boulevard, a few blocks projects work. Midtown’s hous- Anita Bates: The Detroit artist east of Woodward. ing is ideal because parking is so 74 and Wayne State University in- accessible. “People associate He’s not sure where the photography will take him or what he will structor has described her painting pursue next. safety with being able to park style as “abstraction steeped in “I spent so many years collecting things, I don’t have the urge to next to their residence,” he said. spirituality.” Her work fo- take objects so much. Now I’m taking images.” Moving forward, Hurtienne cuses on surface and texture He likes to go off the beaten trail and learn the had this advice: “If someone in the context of decay and history of some of Detroit’s most desolate neighbor- builds on the old Hudson’s site ruin. She has a master of fine hoods. He gets to know people, including the scrap- (on Woodward), let’s not just arts degree from WSU and a make it a box.” bachelor of arts from CCS. pers, who try to subsist by selling the materials they take from old buildings. He finds himself in REBECCA COOK Gilda Snowden (right): Delray a lot. The southwest Detroit neighborhood Camilo Pardo has created a 75 The Detroit painter’s was once an industrial, working class area near the design career from his Detroit work has been greatly influ- studio. Detroit River that has been struggling in recent enced by Detroit’s urban en- years. vironment, where she is Although he went without a car for several years, based, and her studies of he has one now. So he will drive it to an area and ex- American art history. Born plore it on foot. in Detroit in 1954, she re- He said the city’s gentrification is affecting him. ceived bachelor of fine art, “I feel like the city is changing in so many ways. I master of art and master of can’t do what I used to do — using what is wasted. So fine art degrees from WSU. many places are being refurbished. Things I felt were in abundance are not there so much.” See Culture, Page 24 DETROIT BUSINESS MAIN 07-16-07 A 24 CDB 7/12/2007 4:14 PM Page 1 Page 24 CRAIN’S DETROIT BUSINESS July 16, 2007 FOCUS:WOODWARD AT 200 Culture ■ From Page 23 76 Museum of Contemporary A hooded figure for our community,” said Marsha important not to feel isolated climbs the Miro, the Museum of Contemporary here.” Art and Design outside of the Art and Design’s acting director, MOCAD is next to the develop- Museum of ing Sugar Hill Arts District, and there This 22,000-square-foot museum Contemporary president of its board and a found- will be a path between the two. (See and performance-art space opened Art and Design. ing member. in October in a former 1930s Dodge The museum Other founding members and related story, Page 22.) dealership on Woodward Avenue was founded board members include Julie Initially, MOCAD was going to and Garfield in Detroit’s Midtown, by, among Taubman, Keith Pomeroy, Linda be a satellite of the Detroit Institute adding a strong link to Detroit’s others, Marsha Powers, Danialle Karmanos, Cate of Arts, a few blocks north.