HSPV Studio: The Village of Arts and Humanities

The Village of Arts and Humanities invited a 2024 Preservation Studio group to investigate ways in which they “preserve, evolve, and amplify the neighborhood’s history of Black centered arts, activism and community development.” This studio allowed for a learning journey with their mandate in mind. The class was split into three sections. Part 01: Developmental History, Background & Context, and Significance which included research and development and how significance is expressed in tangible and intangible cultural resources. Part 02: Analysis and Reccomendations identified the recommended Treatment and Use and preservation interventions for the Village of Arts and Humanities. These recommendations will provide a framework for decision-making about future use, care, conservation, and preservation of the Village. These policies are to be flexible, living, and overarching for change management and direct future conservation actions.

Our work showed that the Village is a place that in form and space – has existed since before the City of Philadelphia annexed the ancestral lands of the Lenai Lenape, was born from the lack of use and systemic disinvestment of societal forces that found little to no value in place or people, and has – for the last fifty years – used creative expression in material and immaterial ways to be actively anti-capitalist. In doing so, the Village - and the Ile Ife Humanitarian Center before it - have built and shaped an aesthetic and activist empire or enclave that is self-determined, people-powered, and serves as a local, national, and international model for public art, social practice, creative placemaking, and human-centric redevelopment.