WEBVTT 00:00:08.252 --> 00:00:11.152 (loud scraping) 00:00:11.203 --> 00:00:14.800 MEL CHIN: It was after a big  museum show, her first museum show, 00:00:15.701 --> 00:00:22.120 that I was in an elevator, going  down and the voice says, or asks, 00:00:22.120 --> 00:00:24.000 “Mel, what do you love more  than anything in the world?” 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:28.337 And I said, “Well, I love to make things  with my hands. I just love doing that.” 00:00:29.696 --> 00:00:33.343 (drawing on paper) 00:00:33.370 --> 00:00:35.400 The other voice says, “okay, stop.” 00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:40.040 And I listened to that voice. 00:00:40.040 --> 00:00:44.720 By stopping I was able to  flow free in the world again, 00:00:44.720 --> 00:00:49.140 not being held by some delusional  idea of what it meant to be an artist. 00:00:50.920 --> 00:00:56.920 And I felt free to listen to other voices,  other ideas that were in the world. 00:00:56.920 --> 00:01:00.720 NEWSCASTER: It happened on Detroit’s  East side, the 2100 block of Springell. 00:01:00.720 --> 00:01:03.920 You’re watching one of the most  intense fires of this “Devil’s Night.” 00:01:03.920 --> 00:01:05.920 The target—an abandoned home. 00:01:05.920 --> 00:01:10.998 For nearly 2 ½ hours, city firefighters struggled  with low water pressure and a roaring blaze. 00:01:11.025 --> 00:01:20.911 (car motor rumbling) 00:01:23.933 --> 00:01:26.140 CHIN: If you look at the images  of burning homes in Detroit, 00:01:26.140 --> 00:01:30.487 if that’s my recollection of it, I have  to change that image of that house. 00:01:32.560 --> 00:01:39.160 What could you do with that house? You  have no electricity, no water, no money. 00:01:39.160 --> 00:01:43.208 But you have these places decayed  by fire or by abandonment. 00:01:44.560 --> 00:01:48.101 As an artist, you go in to  see what you can contribute. 00:01:48.800 --> 00:01:50.640 That’s where the “Spawn” idea came around— 00:01:50.640 --> 00:01:57.506 It stands for… a covert activity. 00:01:58.160 --> 00:02:01.496 You take the internal organs of a place, 00:02:02.037 --> 00:02:07.000 and you use it in a whole ‘nother  way, rather than just reconstruction. 00:02:07.021 --> 00:02:08.929 (creaking floorboards) 00:02:08.938 --> 00:02:14.514 MAN: But it’s sad to see something  that working and now not working. 00:02:15.258 --> 00:02:17.320 –Can we get up the stairs this way? 00:02:17.320 --> 00:02:21.780 –We’d be better off going up the stairs  the front way. This has got a lot of trash. 00:02:23.200 --> 00:02:26.151 CHIN: This project is about  transformation on many different levels. 00:02:27.120 --> 00:02:32.360 You’re taking what is considered  of no value and of shame and says, 00:02:32.360 --> 00:02:35.520 “No, it has value, but it has  another kind of value, another life.” 00:02:35.520 --> 00:02:38.720 Through the idea of conceptual  art, we can do this. 00:02:39.640 --> 00:02:44.120 It’s almost like kind of, reclaim it out  of the fire. It’s a whole ‘nother idea. 00:02:44.120 --> 00:02:46.320 So it’s a three-year project,  maybe two-year project, 00:02:46.320 --> 00:02:49.180 where you actually see a transformation over time. 00:02:49.180 --> 00:02:51.760 –MAN: And the last I know,  the basement was flooded. 00:02:51.760 --> 00:02:56.800 –CHIN: Okay, so there is a basement to  this? But we got to engineer it correctly. 00:02:56.800 --> 00:02:58.960 So you can work on one half. 00:02:58.960 --> 00:03:02.320 And the whole house can just swing  aside and the basement is revealed. 00:03:02.320 --> 00:03:07.000 Take a whole house, put it on a pivot,  so the whole house can spin aside. 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:11.480 And underneath is all this activity  in the basement of raising earthworms, 00:03:11.480 --> 00:03:15.400 or fishing worms, Devil’s Night  Crawlers that you can sell to 00:03:15.400 --> 00:03:19.000 the large fishing population, -...in a way where it could really help 00:03:19.000 --> 00:03:22.960 transform the vision of  Detroit in a very positive way. 00:03:22.960 --> 00:03:30.680 My contribution is twofold— to create  something that can be living after I’m gone, 00:03:30.680 --> 00:03:33.882 or I’m not a part of it so it can  be returned to the neighborhood. 00:03:33.951 --> 00:03:37.181 (sweeping broken glass) 00:03:37.240 --> 00:03:43.043 And at the same time reclaim an icon  from what it has been depicted now as. 00:03:43.051 --> 00:03:45.531 (sweeping broken glass) 00:03:52.733 --> 00:03:55.473 MAN: Yo, man, you think  it’s going to happen today? 00:03:55.473 --> 00:03:56.647 MAN 2: I hope so. 00:03:57.233 --> 00:04:01.233 MAN 3: Hey, guy, Gerald’s been here  all day. Is it going to happen soon? 00:04:01.233 --> 00:04:01.879 MAN 1: Maybe. 00:04:02.893 --> 00:04:04.000 MAN 4: What you guys doing? 00:04:04.406 --> 00:04:06.153 MAN 2: Well, we’re just waiting for it to happen. 00:04:06.153 --> 00:04:08.229 MAN 4: Come on, guys, you got to make it happen. 00:04:11.113 --> 00:04:12.081 MAN 3: Here we go. 00:04:14.831 --> 00:04:20.400 MAN 2: Gerald, you’re the hardest  working man around. How is it today? 00:04:20.400 --> 00:04:27.840 MAN: Man, I am one happy ass. Big fat worms to  sort for all those rich people’s delicate roses. 00:04:28.967 --> 00:04:29.720 MAN: Fade in to black. 00:04:32.264 --> 00:04:36.880 CHIN: Making art, I think, is not  about one track, not one method, 00:04:36.880 --> 00:04:40.501 but the diversity of mediums  and techniques is minor. 00:04:41.120 --> 00:04:43.640 But the diversity of ideas  and how they survive and the 00:04:43.640 --> 00:04:47.634 methods they are transmitted is very important. 00:04:47.684 --> 00:04:52.847 (ethereal music) 00:04:52.880 --> 00:04:57.120 “Knowmad” is a video game that you sit down, 00:04:57.120 --> 00:05:03.040 and you drive through 36 tribal  carpets that were selected 00:05:03.040 --> 00:05:11.023 based on a mapping of tribes that exist in  Turkey, or Anatolia, in Iran and Afghanistan. 00:05:12.600 --> 00:05:17.120 Tribal cultures are dying, as we  know, or as we have known them, 00:05:17.120 --> 00:05:19.334 after existing for thousands of years. 00:05:21.760 --> 00:05:29.640 Video game culture is thriving, overtaking  Hollywood in terms of how much money it brings in. 00:05:30.800 --> 00:05:35.880 Perhaps in a video game, it can drive  you into a place, a curious place, 00:05:35.880 --> 00:05:40.161 where you might ask the question,  “Where did these patterns come from?” 00:05:51.897 --> 00:05:56.320 It felt like to have the installation  occur with the real tribal rugs 00:05:56.320 --> 00:06:01.080 was a way of allowing peripheral  information to float back into your head 00:06:01.080 --> 00:06:02.760 as you would turn away from the game. 00:06:02.760 --> 00:06:06.452 There’s a real world of rugs  and people there as well. 00:06:08.953 --> 00:06:13.561 That’s a prayer rug, so we want to make sure  it’s pointing in the right direction—east. 00:06:14.800 --> 00:06:17.003 It’s creating a layered environment. 00:06:20.428 --> 00:06:22.560 MAN: Originally, Mel kind of  gave us the concept of what to do 00:06:22.560 --> 00:06:25.800 and the whole driving game aspect and stuff. 00:06:26.480 --> 00:06:30.300 Only he really didn’t know what all  it was going to entail. Half-way. 00:06:31.179 --> 00:06:34.560 MAN: He gave us specific rugs  that he wanted us to use, 00:06:34.560 --> 00:06:39.719 and using software we developed sort  of these abstract obstacle courses. 00:06:42.040 --> 00:06:45.680 This gave us an opportunity to  just sort of make these abstract, 00:06:45.680 --> 00:06:49.320 colorful, make-believe worlds  where there really was no rules 00:06:49.320 --> 00:06:52.560 other than just sort of respect the symbolism 00:06:52.560 --> 00:06:56.703 and the patterns in the carpet and  just kind of go crazy from there. 00:07:04.520 --> 00:07:10.640 CHIN: I wanted to limit my influence. Rather  than saying, “It has to be this, and this,” 00:07:10.640 --> 00:07:14.560 I said, “Sort of see this, but you  do not have to be held to that.” 00:07:14.560 --> 00:07:18.521 Because if we’re going to make  art, it should be liberating. 00:07:24.200 --> 00:07:27.560 My thoughts in the objects I  make or have made have been a 00:07:27.560 --> 00:07:29.520 collection of ideas that have  come from others as well. 00:07:30.240 --> 00:07:36.381 Part of the art is creating the  form for the new invention to occur. 00:07:43.440 --> 00:07:47.880 Knowmad is a digital re-weave of patterns  that have been around for thousands of years 00:07:47.880 --> 00:07:49.713 that we may know nothing about. 00:07:52.440 --> 00:07:56.880 But perhaps in a video game,  we might have that, again, 00:07:56.880 --> 00:08:03.640 the desire to respect what they might  have been, more than just decoration. 00:08:03.640 --> 00:08:05.000 Because they are about people. 00:08:16.560 --> 00:08:21.587 “Revival field” is a simple sculpture  that has this poetic premise. 00:08:23.480 --> 00:08:27.080 In Michaelangelo’s days, he  would have a block of marble, 00:08:27.080 --> 00:08:30.920 and he would have an image in his  mind, incredible images in his mind, 00:08:30.920 --> 00:08:37.284 and he would take the chisel and carve away  until we see something as remarkable as “David.” 00:08:41.160 --> 00:08:44.200 In our contemporary times,  our materials have changed. 00:08:44.200 --> 00:08:47.680 Our materials are still  marble, but they also can be… 00:08:50.640 --> 00:08:52.294 stuff that we’ve never dreamed of using. 00:08:54.480 --> 00:08:56.368 In this case, toxic earth. 00:08:58.960 --> 00:09:03.480 It is the sculpturing of an  ecology from one near death, 00:09:03.480 --> 00:09:08.698 or one that is decayed or  dead, into one that is living. 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:18.868 NARRATOR: The diversity of life has  been deeply affected by industry. 00:09:23.600 --> 00:09:30.200 The smelting of metals, such as zinc, cadmium,  lead, and copper, produces particulates, 00:09:30.200 --> 00:09:33.299 sometimes invisible to the eye,  which contaminate the environment. 00:09:34.200 --> 00:09:37.771 These metal particulates weaken  and destroy many forms of life. 00:09:38.920 --> 00:09:42.459 Long after the smelting is complete,  pollution remains in the soil. 00:09:43.518 --> 00:09:45.979 There have been no viable  solutions to this problem, 00:09:46.520 --> 00:09:51.240 until the “Revival Field'' project,  which proved an existing theory. 00:09:51.240 --> 00:09:56.080 Special plants called hyperaccumulators  are introduced into the barren landscape. 00:09:56.080 --> 00:09:58.520 The metal in the soil would kill most plants, 00:09:58.520 --> 00:10:03.080 but the hyperaccumulators thrive, pulling  the metals into their stems and shoots. 00:10:03.080 --> 00:10:05.339 When the plants mature, they are harvested. 00:10:05.880 --> 00:10:09.200 The plants are then burned in reclaiming furnaces. 00:10:09.200 --> 00:10:14.240 This process yields metal purer than  high-grade ore, which can be resold. 00:10:14.240 --> 00:10:20.440 The continuation of this process cleans the soil  and allows life to return to the environment. 00:10:20.440 --> 00:10:24.317 This renewed ecology is the  completion of a work of art. 00:10:34.119 --> 00:10:38.520 CHIN: I don’t go about trying to make  a science/art project or anything, 00:10:38.520 --> 00:10:44.334 or political project. I think it has  to be driven by some kind of poetry. 00:10:47.400 --> 00:10:55.480 That poetry of plants having the capacity  to transform a system was amazing enough, 00:10:56.134 --> 00:10:58.040 and it was also driven by pragmatism. 00:10:58.040 --> 00:11:04.760 I think you have to have both. It has  a little red cast in it, at the base. 00:11:04.760 --> 00:11:06.634 But I don’t know if that is… 00:11:11.120 --> 00:11:18.261 In this world, there are cultures  dying… and some cultures thriving. 00:11:20.920 --> 00:11:27.534 There are soils that are dead that can  be reborn with the help of a work of art. 00:11:28.560 --> 00:11:36.600 There are neighborhoods, they tell us, that  are dying… but instead they are inspiring. 00:11:36.600 --> 00:11:40.204 We assume that we are living  in a culture of consumption… 00:11:40.880 --> 00:11:44.067 that tells us what to eat and what to dear. 00:11:50.480 --> 00:11:57.512 But it’s not all that. Art for the 21st  century is the same as it’s always been— 00:11:58.120 --> 00:12:00.277 it is never the same. 00:12:11.000 --> 00:12:12.000 MAN: 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:14.520 You know, normally I like to use artificial. 00:12:14.520 --> 00:12:19.200 But if I’m going after that big lunker, or that  ornery wall-eyed pike up here in the great lake, 00:12:19.200 --> 00:12:22.320 I like to use the biggest,  baddest worm of them all— 00:12:22.320 --> 00:12:26.320 Devil’s Nightcrawlers, direct from Detroit City. 00:12:26.320 --> 00:12:29.160 These worms will drive you crazy  with all the fish you gonna catch. 00:12:31.360 --> 00:12:35.520 See what I mean? Devil’s  Nightcrawlers, the Motown worm. 00:12:35.520 --> 00:12:39.840 Guaranteed to catch you mo’ fish, give  you mo’ action than any worm around. 00:12:39.840 --> 00:12:44.346 Devil’s Nightcrawlers,  home-grown in East Side Detroit.