Hanging Out in the Mall
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 12.20.07
Michael Townsend gives new meaning to the term Mall Rat when he and seven other artists moved into a 750 square foot space above a storage room in the Providence Place Mall in Providence, Rhode Island. They carried in two tons of construction material, a sectional sofa, a love seat, a coffee table, a breakfast table with four chairs, lamps, a throw rug, a hutch and paintings on the walls. Not having water or a bathroom, they snuck into the mall to use its facilities and the food court, although they did have a waffle iron and some video games. They kept this up for four years.
Townsend likens it to being "Trummerkind - German for "children of the ruins" - connotes the children of war-torn areas who had lost their families and/or homes, and were left to grow up in a society that required rebuilding and healing. They made their homes in the ally-bombed ruins of cities and towns and lived off the landscapes."
How did they get this in there?
He was inspired by mall ads in 2003 that promoted the mall as not only "a rich shopping experience, but also had all the things that one would need to survive and lead a healthy life. This, along with a wide variety of theoretical musings about my relationship to the mall - as a citizen and public artists - provided the final catalyst for making the apartment. "
In the end, he was arrested and charged with trespassing, but appears to have got off with an apology, which he makes profusely at his website. Good Magazine notes "mall security busted Townsend after discovering an online video of the apartment. "The tragedy was that the plug was pulled before it got even more ridiculous," says Townsend, who had had plans to move in for a full year. He was arrested just three days before he installed wood floors."
You can see a "Reprise and Presentation" until the end of December in Providence here. ::Good , ::Providence Journal, ::Trummerkind
Great, TH glamourizes criminals now. Maybe he can install that flooring in prison, where he can find everything necessary to survive as well. Or maybe he can just move into LLoyd's house without his permission and use his electricity for free?
"Public artist and citizen?" I think he means "Squatting, stealing, tresspassing, vandalizing and homelss criminal citizen."
It begs a good point - we have homeless everywhere and we have malls everywhere.
Hey Tim ... relax.
Did they cause any real harm? Damage?
It shows creativity and initiative. As well, it displays a 'high value' use of space ... that in this case was obviously unused.
There's no shortage of corporations engaging in criminal activity, yet you make a big deal of a few young guys and their otherwise harmless lifestyle project. TH isn't glamourizing criminal activity, but enterprising resourcefulness as well as urban intensification.
Indeed, the mainstream media glamourizes criminal activity all the time with the excessive advertising of products which impose various harm.
Whatever.
D.
Retrofit malls with low-income housing for urban density?
Tim says: I am a grumpy old man who hates creative public art and the use of unused spaces...Pesky tennagers, get off my lawn!
the good and the bad
the good:
well i see how this would help use wasted space, but shopping centers will become jails because those individuals who live in them will never leave simply because everything they ever could need is at their fingertips. there would be issues galore with health and safety and is generally a no.
the bad
do you really want to live above your favorite store? or go to the mall only to find low income families wandering around on their afternoon walks in the 'park'
i think what they did was great. the only crime was being somewhere they probably shouldn't, and since they pulled it off for four years, it's hard to imagine the mall really hadn't noticed!
Good use of wasted space -- too bad they couldn't find a good use for all the mall space wasted by the big retail chains. Still, all in all, a promising start. Now if more people would just stay away from the mall for four years and shop at locally owned non-franchise businesses instead . . .
1.) I smell "movie rights".
2.) Great mall security.
3.) I give them kudos for being creative dwellers.
4.) Statute of limitations has probably expired. Plus, if I were the plaintiff, I would be embarrassed trying to explain to the judge how I missed eight kids living in my mall.
5.) There's plenty of dead malls in this great country...why not put them to good use. Homeless shelters would be one.
This is awesome. I'm not sure why Tim is so upset. Sure, they might have leeched a little electricity, but in return we have eight artists who have made a hilarious and inventive contribution to the community. It's harmless.
I think in Holland there is a law that allows legal squatting in any structure that has been unused for more than 6 months.
"The good and the bad
the good:
well i see how this would help use wasted space, but shopping centers will become jails because those individuals who live in them will never leave simply because everything they ever could need is at their fingertips. there would be issues galore with health and safety and is generally a no.
the bad
do you really want to live above your favorite store? or go to the mall only to find low income families wandering around on their afternoon walks in the 'park'"
chris
I would say your opinion sounds more like the bad and the other bad. So you are saying its better to have stores and the things you need farther away from you? So you have to drive 5-10 mins to get something? Yea, that sounds much healthier than walking, for us and the planet. And yes, I would love to live above my favorite store. But you are right we shouldn't make you have to share your mall with poor people, keep them in the ghettos where they belong right chris?
Sadly, city zoning laws and insurance probably keeps it from being a good laugh.
I know of at lease one office building in the SF Bay Area that had employees building bedrooms above the false ceiling.
I went without an apartment for 2 years when I first took my current job. I kept a cot and my clothes in my car. After work, I went to the gym provided by my employer for a shower. After that everyone had gone home for the evening so I'd come back to the office and set up the cot for sleeping.
Get up early for breakfast at the cafeteria and back to the gym for another shower to get ready.
Saved lots of money that way.