Artist Rosten Woo worked with us in translating the political obstacles into a miniature golf course. Woo created the exhibition and facilitates community/artists workshops, with the possibility that workshop creations be utilized in the exhibition. Likewise, LAPD company members, artists who work and live on Skid Row, devised a theatrical performance based on themes that emerge from this process.
The course’s design is based on 3-D models, each representing one “motivating idea” behind urban development—for instance, a hole illustrating The Costa-Hawkins Act and its effect on rent control or a hole illustrating general principles of “highest and best use”—the way that a building’s form is generated to maximize profit within the law. The structures will be organized chronologically from the origins of the SRO housing model that underpins Skid Row, through the development of zoning for use, and culminating in a three way junction illustrating three possible futures that the re:code project could lead to. Together, these models will form a truly playable golf course, so as to give visitors time to meditate on the didactics, as well as a reason to engage with the entire course. Texts describing each model will be incorporated into a “scorecard,” which visitors would take up upon entering the gallery.
Rosten Woo is a designer, writer, and educator who produces civic-scale artworks and works as a collaborator and consultant to a variety of grassroots and non-profit organizations including the Advancement Project, the American Human Development Project, and the Black Workers Center, as well as the city of Los Angeles and Los Angeles County. His work is designed to help people understand complex systems, re-orient themselves to places, and participate in group decision-making. He is the co-founder and former executive director of the Center for Urban Pedagogy, an New York City non-profit organization that illuminates the built environment to help everyday people engage politics. His work has been exhibited at the Cooper-Hewitt Design Triennial, the Venice Architecture Biennale, Netherlands Architectural Institute, Storefront for Art and Architecture, Lower East Side Tenement Museum, and various public housing developments, tugboats, shopping malls, and parks in New York and Los Angeles.
Materials & Applications (M&A) is a non-profit organization dedicated to building a public culture of experimental architecture in Los Angeles. Our mission is to advance innovative and critical ideas about architectural design through public projects and programs. We produce outdoor installations, workshops, and dialogues in collaboration with architects, artists, and communities.
