Urban planning professor critiques MOCAD's Shrinking Cities exhibit

Wayne State University and University of Detroit Mercy urban planning professor Constance C. Bodurow offers a nuanced critique of Cranbrook and MOCAD's joint "Shrinking Cities" exhibition.

Excerpt:

As a Detroit resident, I'm a bit cynical, given the massive structural issues with which we wrestle, though I acknowledge progress over the years since the exhibition's initiative began. While I don't subscribe to the popular civic boosterism as a substitute for smart, funded urban policy, I also question the extreme lens of Shrinking Cities. There is a vast middle ground of day-to-day life where most citizens of a shrinking city live — not in survival mode in the midst of a bleak landscape, as is the romanticized, extreme urbanism presented here. This middle ground isn't very sexy, but it's the fertile ground that has yet to be addressed. The curators and artists have delivered their provocative position, asking us to ponder Detroit's future.

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