Displaced Art from Evicted Residents of Albany Bulb at "Refuge in Refuse"
KQED Arts
by Dani Burlison
11 February 2015
image: Robin Lasser
In April 2014, more than two dozen people were evicted from their informal settlement at the Albany Bulb along the East Bay shoreline. After a complex battle encompassing land-use issues, homeless advocacy, creative reuse and access to public space — and what, exactly, that access should look like — the residents were offered roughly $3,000 each to pack up and leave.
A former landfill owned by the city of Albany, the Bulb has been a hotly contested space for decades. It’s been utilized as a DIY venue for public sculpture and graffiti art, an ersatz dog park, a point of environmental interest and a home to otherwise unhoused residents reclaiming unused materials to build habitable spaces, at least one of which towered at three stories high. And although the last residents of the Bulb have left the space, many have collaborated with several Bay Area artists and SOMArts for an upcoming exhibit, Refuge and Refuse: Homesteading, Art and Culture, which opens Feb. 12 and runs through Mar. 14.