December 4, 2011
A Detroit Artist’s Whimsical Beautification Project Spurs Urban Renewal
Derek Lieu, for The Chronicle
Tyree Guyton began to decorate houses on Detroit’s poverty-stricken Heidelberg Street in 1986. His efforts helped create a local arts charity, the Heidelberg Project, and helped tame crime in the neighborhood.
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Derek Lieu, for The Chronicle
Tyree Guyton began to decorate houses on Detroit’s poverty-stricken Heidelberg Street in 1986. His efforts helped create a local arts charity, the Heidelberg Project, and helped tame crime in the neighborhood.
Detroit
A shopping cart nestles high in the branches of a tree. Piles of mismatched shoes litter the ground. A weathered piano sits on a street corner. Such items are common along a section of Detroit’s Heidelberg Street, in the heart of one of the nation’s poorest ZIP codes. But none of it is junk.
It all belongs to a neighborhood-size art exhibit created by Tyree Guyton, who grew up on the once-dynamic street and has spent the past quarter century reviving it with his art. In
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