Ice House Detroit

Lately my dad has been stalking these two dudes who are, in the name of art, freezing a Detroit house. There have been a range of uncomfortably political responses to this venture by "the public" (ie: connoisseurs of Yahoo's news feed, "Buzz"). What follows is an interview with my dad about the Ice House. Or as he calls it, the Ice Castle.

(**For more information about the house, check out their blog.)

Q: Hey Dad, so, where is this house?
A: Well, it's on the East side of Detroit, near Mack. On McClellen, about a block and a half north of Mack. On the east side of the street.

Q: What's the area like?
A: It's like many of the neighborhoods on the east side of Detroit, there are more vacant houses than occupied. I'm told by the artist that it's owned by the state, and we were talking about how it is that some houses are owned by the state and some by the city.

Q: How'd you hear about it?
A: Dell (a friend) met them at a DIA event. They sat next to each other at the event. She told me about it, then a few days ago I saw a story about them icing the house or spraying water on the house.

Q: That sort of answers my next question, which is: How, exactly, are they freezing it?
A: They apparently paid the city for a certain amount of water. I asked them how much but they didn't want to tell. They said it was pretty cheap. I said that in the summer when kids try to get a free shower by opening the hydrants, the community ends up paying for it.

Q: Do these men have accents?
A: The guy I talked to has an accent. They're New Yorkers. The guy who was the architect grew up in Detroit. He owns a house in Hamtramck. I asked "Is he Polish?" And his friend said "I don't know what he is." I don't know if he grew up in the part of Detroit where this is taking place. His grandfather is from the neighborhood where the house is, though. They are aware that a lot of foreigners are moving here. They seem to agree or make the same observation that Detroit is a place where a lot of young people can have a new start. For whatever reason they seem to be able to see down the line, where things are going to get better in the city... for those who get in early and get a place, stake their claim, maybe they can get a new start. Strangely enough some of the people investing in houses are drug dealers. Not for dealing drugs but to get their cronies in there to keep the places from being fire bombed. I'm told that this one guy owns twenty houses, and his main source of income is drugs. They'll use the houses as a source of income. Entrepreneurs come in all shapes and sizes. I was telling some guy about it and he said, "the Kennedy's got started the same way." Joseph Kennedy Sr., Robert, Ted and Bobby's father, was a rum runner, who brought in illegal liqueur from Canada to the US. Later on he got honest, but that's how he made his fortune. It's like the godfather. That story is not just relevant to Italians. A lot of people have done illicit things to get a foothold, and the first thing they want to do is to get legit. Get out of drugs, prostitution and get into legitimate businesses. People who have a truncated memory have a hard time comparing these guys who are dealing crack to Joseph Kennedy, but in a sense they're doing the same thing. Acquiring property in the hopes of one day going legit. And since they can get the property so cheap-- in a city where you can buy a house for a dollar-- the feds can't come by and ask how you got all that money.

Q: What kind of clothing did they wear?
A: They look like anybody else. Detroit's a blue collar town and they look like, if they weren't doing that, they might have been some guys who were laid off at the Chrysler plant or going to Wayne State. They looked to be late twentyish, early thirties. One of them had a Cannon camera. They don't seem to know a lot about the neighborhood, which this one guy seemed a bit ashamed of. I was saying with streets like Goethe, Shilling and Lessing, it must have been a German neighborhood, and this guy said he didn't know. I think he felt a little guilty about not knowing enough about the neighborhood.

Q: What are their stated/implied goals?
A: From what I can see they are going to make this ice castle, and then the photographer is going to photograph it with an 8x10 camera and make blow up prints. Clearly they don't intend to thaw it out and live in it. After they're done with it, it will become a body of work I suppose. One's an architectural photographer, the guy I talked to yesterday-- Gregory. The other is an architect, Matthew.

Q: What did they say to you when they noticed you were taking photographs?
A: He thought I was like anybody else, I wasn't using a professional camera, just a point and shoot. I guess I was elevated one step above everybody who was taking pictures with their cell phones, but when I asked him to stand so I could take a picture of him in front of the house, he was OK with that. When a guy came by with a Detroit jacket on and I ran across the street to get a picture of that, he said, "I want that picture too!"

Q: So when you were standing there, looking at their art, what revelations did you have?
A: One of the things I noticed was, on the front porch is a red door. And I was thinking: how ironic. Fire and ice. The red being fire, the ice being what it is. I could see the value in what they were doing, as making a statement. It's not the same thing as making sand castles because that requires more skill, but what's the guy who slings paint? Jackson Pollack. I can see that as requiring the same kind of... you have no idea what you're going to get. It's all serendipitous. You can't really shape the icicles. The same way Pollack might say, "I need to splash some more over here," I don't see it being any different. Not as colorful, but it's... what you accomplish by going through this process is valid because the person thought about doing it, and then they executed it, and then they're going to make it permanent by photographing it. The house is already on the junk heap so to speak, but it's sort of a clever thing to do. It's not the same thing as buying the house and refurbishing it. But because of the photographs, the house will live on beyond the wrecking ball, which is I'm sure how it's going to meet it's end.

Q: What did they say when you invited them to take part in Detroit Ho's Annual Seminole Street Artist's Colony and Exhibition/Festival?
A: I didn't mention it. I will take a spin by there tomorrow and see if they're there and uh, mention it to them. I didn't want to talk as if I was trying to take over their project or in some way try and compromise what they were doing.

Q: Did it seem, at any point, that the artists were questioning the effectiveness/methodology of their conceptual work?
A: I think, I don't think they had any doubts about what they were doing or how they were going to accomplish it. They felt that they had to justify it to people who were asking them questions. The only thing they were concerned about was doing it before the weather got warmer. They are working the same way a film company would. They got permits, that way you're not harassed by the cops, and the city is glad to see that someone is doing something positive. Now that they've got all this publicity they have to do something with it. Actually I think they're missing an opportunity. The house shouldn't be the goal, the community should be the goal. Everything that people said when they were looking, that should have been recorded. They should have filmed everybody who had come to see it. Call it the Ice House, but let the Ice House be the thing to initiate discussion about the city. You got people's attention, now do something with it. That's your project, that's your story. That would probably tell them more about human nature, art, a lot of things... it's almost as if they're frozen in time more than the house that they've created. They should record the enthusiasm that this house has generated. [The next day he spoke to the artists on this point again, and they mentioned that they were collecting email responses to the project, and working to reach out to the community]. [Click here for footage Lester took at the ice house.]

Q: Did it seem, at any point, that the neighbors of the Ice House were questioning the effectiveness/methodology of the conceptual work?
A: People were generally impressed by what they were doing, and curious about what was going on. Cars were stopping, people were taking pictures with cell phones, getting out and parking to find out what was going on. There was only one guy who was like, "What the hell? What's going on?" And I told him these two guys were making an art project out of the house, and he saw two black guys and assumed I meant them. I said, not those two, this one guy and his partner. And then he got sour. He said "Well why didn't they do it in their own home?" He seemed amused when he thought it was the black guys, and then pissed when he realized they were white. I found it strange that he got so upset about two guys spraying ice on a house when so many houses are gutted and stripped. It doesn't take anything away from the house, it makes for a colorful display for everyone in the neighborhood to share. To me he got pissed off about the wrong thing. But I think a lot of people are pissed off in general, and when they can find something specifically to get pissed off about, they embrace that. A lot of people seem to get angry that whites are moving back to the city. This one guy was complaining once, "They're just moving us out of the city," but when I asked where he lived, he lived in the suburbs, and I said, "It sounds like you left the city." It's the same thing in South Central LA, guys come back and get mad when they see all the signs are in Spanish-- but when I ask them where they live they say "Georgia."

Q: Did you tell Grandma about it? What did she say?
A: I think she saw it on the news. Since I've been here, a week today, they've been on three TV networks.

Q: How about Aunt Cora May-- what did or would she say if she saw?
A: (Laughs) What's her favorite expression? "Lord have mercy." And it's not what she says that would be so profound, but what that means. "What's wrong with these poor people? Why are they out in the cold? Don't they have something better to do?" I think she would just think they were crazy. Aunt Cora May is like every man. Every other person who comes by and says "What the hell is that about?"

Q: What would Grandpa have said?
A: (Long pause) You know, I don't know. I think my father would just laugh. I don't think it would make any sense to him whatsoever. Maybe a waste of time, or, express dismay I guess that somebody could actually get paid for doing something so crazy. Work to my father was about doing something that earned money, and there were certain legitimate jobs. When I told him I wanted to be a photographer, he said "OK OK. That I understand. But what do you want to do for a living?" I thought he was short sighted, but I remember Tom Bradley once said in earshot of anybody who happened to be listening, that photography is not really a job. And uh, it was just something that people did for a hobby. Of no value whatsoever. And I thought less of Tom Bradley, and more of my father when I heard that from him. My father said it because it wasn't something he'd experienced in his life as a means for making a living. But Tom Bradley was supposedly an educated, sophisticated man, and I thought it was interesting that he thought nothing of insulting everyone around him.

Q: Uncle Paul?
A: I would ask Uncle Paul. Uncle Paul would no doubt say something interesting or insightful. What, exactly, I don't know.

Q: Uncle Ted?
A: I think Ted'd just think they're crazy.

Q: Lisa? (my sister)
A: Lisa saw it. I did ask her opinion, she thought it was sort of interesting.

Q: Mom?
A: Ask mom. I sent her a picture and she said she'd received a picture from your cousin when these guys first showed up. I think when I go back around there I'll ask people "What do you see? What does it mean to you? What does it mean about Detroit?"

Q: Picasso?
A: Been there, done that.

Q: One person responded to this project by saying, "I will be happy to donate....as long as he promises to freeze the entire city and all the low lifes in it !! And keep it frozen !! What's the H.S. graduation rate in Detroit.....Last I heard it was around 23%. Freeze these idiots and get them out of our way so we can do something productive!!! (sic)" Another with, "shame on anyone who condones this action, shame on the bank who is allowing this to happen. You can not allow things like this to go on when this was somones HOME, it is like having a clown show up at a funeral. (sic)" Will the public's general disdain for/lack of education about Detroit, compassion and conceptual art get in the way of this project's impact?
A: Well to the person who's saying the stuff about high school graduation rates, they're using this as a springboard to talk about what you'd like to do to all these people who you consider unfit or not useful. He's not really talking about the project, he's talking about how he feels about people who drop out of school. Without understanding why this is occurring. The graduation rate in this city... if you're going to start freezing people in Detroit you'll have to start freezing people in sunny California. The institution has failed the students as much as the students have failed to navigate the institution. It's just another way of saying if you can survive, you deserve it, otherwise you're standing in the way of progress. If all these people disappeared tomorrow would things get any better? I doubt it. As for the other comment, I suppose a person could feel that way about what they're seeing. I think the artists tried to find out about who occupied the house and when and they failed. If he's saying that this person probably lost his house because it was foreclosed, that is sort of sad, but... I don't assume that the guy who made this statement made any effort to find out who lived in the house, or found out about the neighborhood and why it went down. Sure, people can show up and turn a house into an ice castle to say something about Detroit, the house is probably a symbol of the city. Whether or not that's someone laughing at Detroit, I don't think it's that. If they're laughing about Detroit then there's a whole lot of laughing to be done about the rest of the country. Maybe what the guy is really saying is "This is my f**** city." If that's the case, well say it! If you're pissed off about it, say it. Don't hide behind this suggestion that it was somebody else's home... if you feel that it's your city, it's your funeral, say you're pissed off about that.

Q: OK. Thanks Dad.
A: Can I go to bed now?