Street of lost dreams and broken hearts

from ColdType 232 - March 2021

Rage rules in citizen protests

roBert GumBert

u In 2016 the Super Bowl came to San Francisco. The unhoused were ‘urged’ to move to the ironically named Division Street (right) where, city officers hoped, they would be ‘invisible’. Amid the unlimited wealth and consumption of that ‘super’ week, the unhoused went about their lives, crowded together in their tents or sleeping rough on the ground. There were no facilities, no promises of permanent housing were given.

Division Street is where this project began and

from which it gets its name. The voices of the unhoused are integral to this project. First-person storytelling, messages left on the street, media headlines and politicians’ characterisations make Division Street a collaboration between many communities.

Division Street, through photographs and words, becomes a metaphor for the ‘division’ of communities, between the wealth of the few and the expendability of the many, in San Francisco, the USA and across the world.

Division Street, the new book by Robert Gumpert, from publisher Dewi Lewis, is a story of lives lived on hard streets, among staggering wealth and empty promises, told through photos, found text and firstperson narratives.

TOP Peter Marshall Qualls, 47. “I’ve been without a place since I was ten-and-half-years-old. We share time together and trust one another and in turn give each other security and hope.”

RIGHT Tyrone Butler, 59. “I’ve been without a home for 18 years. The hardest thing about being on the streets is dealing with the activities that’s out on the streets at night time. Only the strong survive and the weak, they sleep.”

ABOvE Ricky Walker, 48, and Becca Hogue, 42. Ricky has been 10 years without a home, Becca 2 years. “We all need a place to take refuge, to take a break from things and have some space, some privacy. So I equate shelter with privacy and having these things.”

LEFT Ashanti Jones, 44. “I’ve been on the streets all my life. They moved us out of this alley, told us to pack up, that they were sending out resources. That they were going to put us in hotel rooms. We packed well into the night and no one came, and so I said let’s go in this parking lot.”

ABOvE Caleb Jay Jenkins, 60. Without a home: for 49 years. “I’ve never been inside, (to me home’s) a big box with heat in it.”

RIGHT Paul Rogers, 59. Without a home “Off and on 41 years because that’s how long my addiction has been with me. Accepting help is alright when the help comes that’s really helping and not just trying to shove me out of the way.”