I took this picture on Heidelberg Street in Detroit. I did a whole series of the Heidelberg Project. The entire street is filled with various colors of polka-dots, along with yards, porches, houses, etc. decorated with (if you want to put it that way) "sculptures" made from junk. Literally, made with things that Tyree Guyton, the artist responsible for the project, collects from junk yards and makes into his artistic collection. Now, Guyton is a known artist, who has done many artist-in-residence programs, including the one he just finished in Australia. Tyree Guyton has won numerous awards for his work, but the City of Detroit has bulldozed the project down twice already, once in 1991 and again in 1999. Tyree, however, just started constructing it again. I think the whole thing is pretty cool, actually, but I don't have to live next door. Here is what I really like about it: the Heidelberg Project is the 4th most visited art sight in Detroit (after the DIA, Cranbrook, and Hart Plaza). Tyree won't charge anyone to walk down the street, of course, and look at what he has put together. But he will take donations and all the donations go to help youth in Detroit. When I read the brochure, the part that struck me the most is that the Heidelberg Project exists in a community where the mortality rate for young African American males is 50%. Tyree's artistic vision was to take a stand against the decay, crime and apathy in the neighborhood where he was raised by using discarded objects from everyday life to create a festival of color and meaning which he discribes as "Ghetto Guggenheim." Even though studies have shown that art education improves overall academic performance, most Detroit public schools no longer have art programs. That's really too bad. I will stop rambling on and on now, but if anyone looking at this and still reading this far down wants to see more from Heidelberg, check out the website at [link].