Braddock Journey

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

When I started writing about my experiences in Braddock I was encouraged to write about the bad as well as the good. The stereotype of Braddock as a violent place has not proven to be true. People on the streets are friendly, we’ve felt safe exploring this city. What has surprised me is the ongoing attention of a church in Braddock to a mural that was removed. I didn’t expect that I would need to write about aggressive acts by a church.

The Mural
On Sunday, August 17, I was part of a foursome that set up a 48-hour art-installation café. We cleaned and set up two rooms in the former convent as a café in hopes that someone might be able to take it on as a working café later. For now, it’s just two pretty rooms sometimes used for private events. Our long-term goal is for it to become something similar to a co-op café that is available to everyone in Braddock, not just those who drive through. In addition to providing local access, a co-op café would provide training for volunteers who could then use their barista skills in other places.

The name was The Bad Habit because it was a coffee shop in a former convent. When she heard the name, an artist who was in town from Canada made a parody sketch of Clint Eastwood in a habit. It made everyone laugh so we used it. She painted it on the wall in the parking lot right before she headed back to Canada.

The Reaction
Then people from Good Shepherd catholic church started showing up. They were not laughing.

A group of women tried to push their way into the front door as someone who had just arrived that morning was walking out the door. At least two vans with people peering through the back windows pulled into the parking lot and idled there while reviewing the mural. Another group came back after the mural was removed to scour the grounds, looking for hidden art that might be offensive. The mural was painted over immediately, and the name of the café was removed. No one ever argued that the mural should stay, we didn’t intend to offend. As soon as there was a complaint it was down in the time it took to roll black paint over it. It seems like the church would be happy with this.

Still, I can think of no word more accurate than censorship to describe the suppression of a mural due to the material being found objectionable only by certain standards. I believe it was an over-reaction on the part of the church, but I want to reinforce that the mural was not an attack on religion as a whole or any specific church.

The Follow Up
After all of this, the pastor found my personal email address. We had what seemed to be a decent conversation. I felt I understood his point more and that they had not been as intentionally aggressive in their attack on the mural or those around it as it appeared that day. He claimed to not know of most of the things I considered aggressive that happened at the former convent.

But then he forwarded a portion of our email discussion to a catholic publication in Pittsburgh that is going to “quote” me based on the email (that I did not send them) in an article about the mural. The mural that was already removed.  Although this is always a possibility with email, forwarding a private discussion to a publication breaches an ethical boundary for both a pastor and a journalist. I am glad that the editor of the publication contacted me to check information because the forward said that I run the artist’s web site and implied the café was a business. It was referring to this site, which is not about Emily or in any way hers. And it assumed I owned the café. There are posts on the café because I was involved in the installation. This post is about the mural because the church has continued to keep the issue alive, and draw me into it, even though it was removed last week.

I will continue to update this post if things continue. The name and artwork were changed, the café is not a business—I see no reason for further progression.