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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 21, 2014)
street roots 8 Nov. 21, 2014 Pressing the issue Artist, provocateur A rt Hazelwood talks imagery and action on the homeless front that kind of thing. I encountered (Street Roots sister paper) Street Sheet, the street or decades, Art Hazelwood has used publication of the Coalition of his sinister style of art as a means of Homelessness, and thought I could educating society about complex contribute to i t I sent them some work, and social issues by way of posters and books. it wasn’t necessarily political but it was life- His often dark and nefarious-looking images on-the-street imagery, and I started frequently attack powerful figures that he producing work directly for them. The believes are directly contributing to poverty. editor would give me a topic: “We’re doing The 52-year-old San Franciscan creates an issue on addiction.” I would create the majority of his screen prints for Street something for i t For me, at first it was: “Oh, Sheet, a publication of the Coalition on I’m getting my work outlhere. I’m Homelessness, and for the Western connecting to something.” But later making Regional Advocacy Project WRAP has art for Street Sheet politicized my work and brought West Coast organizations fighting it taught me more about the issues. My homelessness, including Street Roots, immediate connection to homelessness was together since 2005, and is currently a real desire to connect to people who are promoting the Homeless Bill of Rights in underserved in our community. I was California and Oregon. connected to disability rights as well when I A recently released book written by first moved to San Francisco for similar WRAP director Paul Boden, “House Keys reasons. Not Handcuffs: Homeless Organizing, Art and Politics in San Francisco and Beyond,” E.G.: The new book, “House Keys Not features a selection of posters Hazelwood Handcuffs,” examines 30 years of activism in created for the organization over a 15-year an effort to examine what worked and what period, along with an essay from the artist didn’t. After reflecting on your own activism about the growing influence of art in efforts as an artist, is there a time when you homeless community organizing. feel your art was particularly effective and what was the end result? Em ily Green: A t what point in your life did you decide to marry your art with political A.H.: The arc of time, the 30-year period activism, and what inspired you to focus on really starts out with very little art - issues around homelessness? handwritten signs - and then the Street Sheet came into existence almost 10 years A rt Hazelwood: I moved [to San into i t At that point the artwork that was Franciscof in 1993. I’d been doing art that supporting the coalition and its activism, my people told me was political, but it was work included, was mostly created for Street really just social commentary, street life, Sheet, as opposed to street a r t And I felt BY EMILY GREEN Above, Art Hazelwood’s print “In the Balance” depicts global, injustice. A scale holds the world - the 99 percent - on one side and those in power on the other. A female figure representing justice and democracy attempts to balance the off- balance system. STAFF W R ITER F like that was an effective information tool - as a way to reach people without heavy tex t It really started to broaden in the early 90s when we basically started using artwork in more ways. We started using it as street posters and working with other groups, like advertising agencies to do bus ads, for example. For me, the real useful part of my artwork came when WRAP was bom in 2006, and I started working with (WRAP Executive Director) Paul Boden to organize artists to answer the question: Why are there homeless in such and such numbers in relation to federal government spending numbers? We were basically taking data and making art to tell the story of that data, and I think those are very effective posters. E.G.: You mentioned that posters can be more effective than plain text. Can you elaborate on that a little? A.H.: People take in information in different ways. For some people, reading an essay about something gives them See HAZELWOOD, page 9 P H O T O BY FR A N C ISC O D O M IN G U E Z A rt Hazelwood at a protest in San • Francisco.
