Project Row Houses

 

Rick Lowe at Project Row Houses - Image MacArthur Foundation website

     In one of Houston's oldest African American neighborhoods iconic row houses are now galleries for public art. Begun in 1993, Project Row Houses has revitalized the community via art and the provision of community support. The goal of the project is to use public art to improve the physical condition of the neighborhood, to preserve the historic row houses, to serve the community, and to provide education opportunities for the children.

     Leading the project is Rick Lowe, a social practice artist who in the early 1990's became interested in art for public betterment. With a group of fellow artists, twenty-two run down shotgun houses were purchased. Built in the 1930's, shotgun houses are narrow, with rooms one behind the other and doors at each end of the house. A shotgun fired through the front door would exit the back door, thus the name.

     The legacy of John Biggers, an award winning Houston muralist, is evidenced in all aspects of the project. The Department of Art at Texas Southern University, then known as Texas State University for Negroes, was established by Biggers in 1949. As a professor at the university and an artist in Houston he influenced artists until his retirement in 1983. Rick Lowe was one of those artists.

     Project Row Houses operates under the guidance of the Five Pillars espoused by John Biggers, which are Creativity, Education, Architecture, Social Safety Nets and Sustainability. With these pillars as the framework, Project Row Houses is an arts venue, an arts based education center, an advocate for livable architecture, a young mothers residence program and a small business incubator.

    Undoubtedly also influenced by Fred Wilson, a fellow MacArthur Genius Grant awardee, Lowe is now a member of the Curatorial Advisory Council of The Contemporary. The Contemporary is a museum that does not collect and has not building. Located in Baltimore, The Contemporary teamed up in the early 1990's with the Maryland Historical Society to organize an exhibit that was truly relevant to the surrounding African American neighborhood. Fred Wilson, an installation artist, was engaged in a one year residency to curate an exhibit that did not take the traditional historical view.. The display techniques used by Wilson were traditional, the objects were not. For example, in the Metalwork 1793-1880 display, right in the middle of elegant silver pieces was an iron leg shackle. 

     While remaining with Project Row Houses, Rick Lowe also has also initiated arts based redevelopment projects in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, in New Orleans post-Katrina and in a community market in Dallas. Mr. Lowe was the recipient of a 2014 MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant. 


The tour begins:

The Art Department at Texas Southern University located in the neighborhood, with John Biggers as the founder and Rick Lowe as student has profound impact on Project Row Houses.

Image - Wikipedia - Project Row Houses

Spend a moment listening to Rick Lowe about his vision of art for social practice:

John Biggers, Shotgun, third Ward #1, 1966, tempera and oil, 30 x 48 in.,  Image - Smithsonian American Art Museum  website