A group of artists is spending frigid days this week digging through piles of rubble at one of the Detroit Public Schools demolition sites.
Detroit Public Schools officials granted access to the site of the former Munger Middle and Chadsey High Schools to artists from the 555 Nonprofit Gallery and Studios. Jacob Montelongo Martinez is the gallery's creative director. He’s one of the artists salvaging brick and limestone from the demolished Munger Middle School and Chadsey High School in Southwest Detroit.
Martinez says the materials will be used to build archways, paths and benches at a “reading garden” outside a Detroit Public Library branch nearby.
"For me it’s ... a metaphor. The archways are a gateway to the community, a gateway to education."
Eric Froh is an artist who’s spending a frigid day hunting for treasures in the piles of rubble left by the excavators demolishing the buildings. Many of the large limestone pieces have been broken.
"But all this stone we can rework and make it into something new again. Like this," he says, pulling a piece of limestone with carved details from the pile.
The scavenged bricks and limestone will be used to build archways, paths and benches for a “reading garden” at a nearby Detroit Public Library branch.
Chadsey and Munger are being torn down to make way for a new Pre-K through 8th grade school building on the site.
