Wahnabezee and the future [hi]stories of place
In collaboration with
Olaia Chivite Amigo, Jonathan Rule, Ana Morcillo Pallares, Claudia Wigger, David Porter
Research Assistants
Yunsong Li, Nick Kim, Axel Olson, Ella Edelstein, Ann Borek, Qilmeg Doudatcz, Shreya Vadrevu, Khalid Aburajab Altamimi, Sanjana Jismon, Taru, Wenyuan Zhang, Quan Li], Julia Zhang, Zachary Darmanian-Harris
Community Partners
Belle Isle Conservancy,
Detroit Historical Society
Sponsored By
The Michigan Mellon Project on the Egalitarian Metropolis Towards an Inclusive Recovery for Detroit.
The Alan and Cynthia Berkshire Fund for Pressing Matters at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning at the University of Michigan.
Date
2023
Wahnabezee and the future [hi]stories of place is a project supporting the co-creation and circulation of community narratives along the waters of the Detroit River. Wahnabezee, also known as Belle Isle Park, is an enchanted island, a real site and an imagined place, and a fluid commons of sorts. For centuries, the island has served as refuge and sanctuary, a shared natural resource for humans and non-human species alike.
Through the collection and circulation of real and imagined narratives, memories, images, maps and other traces, we aim to steward the future of the public park as a pluralistic cultural commons, a place of belonging and wonder. While narratives of the island abound, many accounts remain incomplete, largely unacknowledged or have been erased from our collective memory. What [hi]stories are yet to be told, and who may tell them? How could they be shared and circulated?