LA Commons: Engaging Youth in Community-based Cultural Tourism

Los Angeles is home to many communities that represent the largest concentration of a given ethnicity outside of the country of origin. The city has a network of ethnic enclaves that are rich with traditions, history, art, cuisine and community. Yet these neighborhoods are often defined by disinvestment, high poverty rates and physical deterioration. Given the growing popularity of “cultural tourism,” a valuable opportunity exists to leverage local cultural assets to create a community-based cultural tourism model aimed at developing local economic and social capital. LA Commons has partnered with the UCLA Department of Urban Planning to implement a program called Uncommon LA to work with culturally rich neighborhoods to take advantage of this opportunity. The model being developed by the team fuses the LA Commons community-engaged approach to artistic and cultural programming with the Urban Planning department’s emphasis on community and economic development practices. Young people play a central role in the model as documenters of local experience, creators of artwork that reflect this experience and interpreters of local culture for visitors to the neighborhood.

Case Study: MacArthur Park, One of Los Angeles’ Most Storied Neighborhoods

Painting in foreground by student artist Devi Ramirez as part of Fear/Less Installation in MacArthur Park. Photo by Dolores Chavez Click here to enlarge

Early in its history, MacArthur Park was known as the Champs-Elysees of Los Angeles. The site of a natural lake fed by an underground spring, it is an oasis in the middle of the city. At the end of the 19th century, wealthy Angelenos would visit the area as a vacation spot, to see and be seen and to get a little R & R. The park wasn’t always called by its current name; that came after General Douglas MacArthur gained heroic status in World War II. During a very different time later in the century, disco queen Donna Summer captured its mythic essence, with her recording of “MacArthur Park,” as a dynamic center for people from all over the city to participate in celebrations and demonstrations, recreation and veneration. As with much of the urban core, the area began to decline in the 1970s and by 1985 was one of the most crime-ridden and violent neighborhoods in the city. Thankfully, a community-based effort is revitalizing MacArthur Park, although the mostly Central American and Mexican immigrants who live in this densely populated enclave still struggle with ongoing challenges related to gang activity, poverty, low educational attainment and the current wave of anti-immigrant feelings.

In 2002, the Institute for Urban Research and Development (IURD) opened a restaurant and training center for local tamale and other vendors called Mama’s Hot Tamales in MacArthur Park. It was part of a larger effort by the city’s Community Development Department to enable street vendors, of which there were many, to operate legally in the neighborhood. Street vending is illegal in California but the city got around this by creating an ordinance to establish a “sidewalk vending district” to be managed by IURD. IURD took its role very seriously, developing a training program and colorful carts for use by the vendors. The small fee paid by the vendors also gave them access to support in setting up and to the restaurant’s kitchen to make the tamales, which were also sold in the restaurant. This cultural and economic development program, in a neighborhood that was all but written off, created a center for community-building activity.

Growing out of the activities at Mama’s Hot Tamales, Rediscover MacArthur Park is a group consisting of key stakeholders interested in neighborhood revitalization from law enforcement, the local neighborhood council, the city recreation and parks department, etc. — all focused on reclaiming MacArthur’s Park’s history and celebrating its present status as a hub for Central American culture in the city. The group welcomes visitors to the area as a strategy for furthering its agenda for improving the neighborhood.

Art Tells the Untold Story

In this context, a group of 13 artists, mostly young people between the ages of 15 and 25, with two more experienced artists as their guides, focused in Winter and Spring 2008 on creating an art installation in MacArthur Park and a place where shoppers, diners, park-goers and, in particular, local residents could transcend their everyday fears and connect with the joyful stories of the neighborhood and the beauty of the enhanced physical space.

The process for creating the artwork consisted of several phases — mapping the neighborhood and story gathering, design, fabrication and installation. Lead Artist Reyes Rodriguez said of project:

As the lead artist …I was presented with the challenge to work with art students from Miguel Contreras High School and young community artists on an installation that evolved around the concept of FEAR and how it related to the surrounding community …I felt a responsibility to hear, listen and see but also to create a framework that would allow room for individual interpretation and still be beautiful, stimulating and work with the surroundings. To achieve this we had a series of meetings where we talked about what fear meant to each one of us and to see the similarities in our stories and experiences. It was also important to me to talk about that special place or thing that would make us forget about the fear and I stressed to them that it was just as — or more — important to the project to express that emotion because everyone needs a place to go where you can forget about your fears.

The resulting project, “Fear-Less,” sited at the corner of 7th and Alvarado, consisted of a canopy over an area approximately 18’x18’ with three long banners overhead that gave shade and were decorated with colorful silhouettes from photos of park-goers. Surrounding the canopy area were paintings by the students based on their own stories and on stories that they gathered as part of the project. All of the paintings had silhouettes of photos the students took of themselves or people in the park. The paintings wrapped around the trees so that when one stood in the middle one was surrounded by artwork that could be viewed at eye level, allowing the viewer to pick and choose and enjoy them from afar or go up close to see the details of the stories that each canvas revealed.

This installation was a project of LA Commons in partnership with the Central American Resource Center, Mama’s Hot Tamales and the local high schools in the area. Other supporters included the James Irvine Foundation, the Dwight Stuart Youth Foundation, the Office of Councilman Ed Reyes and the City of Los Angeles Departments of Cultural Affairs and Recreation and Parks.

At the opening of “Fear-Less” on May 10, in attendance were the artists, organizational partners and supporters as well as a group of 60 participants in a tour sponsored by the Autry National Center. Many of the tour-goers had never been to this part of town or met the residents who shared their stories on this day. Young people took the lead in explaining their installation, impressing all with their commitment to their community and the beauty of their artwork. Using art to facilitate this interaction between two very different segments of the city and to open a door for continued communication is what LA Commons is all about.

LA Commons: Engaging Communities in Telling Their Stories

The mission of LA Commons, a project of Community Partners, is to engage communities in artistic and cultural expression that tells their unique stories and serves as a basis for dialogue, interaction and a better understanding of Los Angeles. We bring our community-based art initiatives to neighborhoods where residents, and in particular, young people, have little access to artistic participation and the benefit that comes from witnessing one’s own creative power. LA Commons is committed to implementing multiple projects over time in the same neighborhoods, with the goal of increasing participants’ involvement in the civic landscape, building the capacity of local organizations to implement cultural projects, and leveraging the neighborhoods’ cultural assets into increased tourism and economic activity.

Our Guiding Principles:

• Everybody has a story to tell and experiences/knowledge worth sharing.
• Art is a powerful tool for telling stories, bridging difference and building community.
• People want to connect with other people.
• Collective participation in art and cultural activities fosters strong relationships.
• Artists have an important role to play in the community development process.
• Culture is a valuable community resource.

LA Commons began implementing programs in late 2002, starting with a tour of Koreatown, and created its first public art projects in 2003 in MacArthur Park and Koreatown. In 2006, LA Commons began leading cultural tours on a regular basis, creating ways for people from outside our target communities to experience the public art and the people and stories these works reflect. In 2006, UCLA became a major partner in our cultural tourism/economic development activities, a significant milestone that has contributed to our growth over the past several years.

Our Programs

Youth artist speaks to participants on a tour to MacArthur Park sponsored by the Autry National Center. Photo by Anne MacAulay Click here to enlarge

Our approach is two-fold. The first component is our community-based art initiatives, through which we hire local artists and young people to translate community stories into public art. Since its inception, LA Commons has implemented 18 community-based art initiatives in eight neighborhoods - MacArthur Park, Koreatown, Chinatown, Mid-City, Sylmar, East Hollywood (Little Armenia and Thai Town), Leimert Park and Highland Park - involving 45 artists, 250 youth and 1000 community members in the art-making process and several thousand as audience members.

Leveraging the neighborhood stories and network of organizations and businesses that LA Commons has developed through its community-based art initiatives, Uncommon LA — the second component of our work - is a partnership with the UCLA Department of Urban Planning to support low-income cultural districts in promoting their assets to a broader public, attracting visitors and their dollars. Uncommon LA was launched in 2007 with Trekking Los Angeles: Local Adventures in a Global City, a series of cultural tours and activities in three pilot neighborhoods — Leimert Park, Highland Park and East Hollywood (Little Armenia and Thai Town). For the past two years, Trekking Los Angeles has successfully connected Angelenos from around the city — and a few out-of-town tourists — with festivals, public art, restaurants, cultural centers and artists from the three communities. The events also served as an opportunity to connect audience members from a wide cross-section of the Los Angeles region with each other.

Los Angeles: A City Full of Stories

Living in an area that spans 500 square miles and is divided into 89 neighborhoods, Los Angeles residents hail from 140 countries and speak 224 languages. By any standard these numbers make L.A. a challenging city to live and work in. In our work to give people greater access to their city, we have partnered, for example, with Koreans in Koreatown, Thais in Thai Town and Armenians in Little Armenia. For each of these groups, Los Angeles is home to the largest population of nationals living outside their home country. This is true for many immigrant groups based in L.A., which is often called the Ellis Island of the 21st Century. What tends to occur, here and everywhere there are sizable numbers of immigrants, is that people from the same country congregate in the same geographic space as they seek familiar faces, customs and foods, as well as acceptance, in their new homeland. Thus, there are many enclaves in the city that are the residential or cultural homes for people from the same national origin, ethnic or racial groups. These communities, which reflect the identity of the inhabitants, are appealing places to visit because of the opportunity to experience a distinctive culture through food, music, art and, most important, the people that live there. Their rich narratives provide the basis for tours by visitors, since they often blend the traditions from the old country with the dynamic experiences in the new.

In recent years, we have focused our work in four neighborhoods: Leimert Park, Highland Park, East Hollywood and MacArthur Park.

Leimert Park in South L.A. is seen as the heart of the African-American art scene anchored by the historic Vision Theater, once owned by TV legend Marla Gibbs and now a city facility. The area is home to a range of small cultural organizations including the World Stage founded by now deceased jazz drummer Billy Higgins, and Kaos Network, a center for the development and performance of art and music based in hip-hop culture. Leimert Park’s residents earn on average $22,700 annually, just above the L.A. County level, however the most densely populated census tract within the neighborhood earns 16 percent less than the county average, or $17,400.

Located in the Eastern portion of Hollywood, Thai Town contains the largest number of Thai businesses in the city, including restaurants, textile and clothing shops and outlets for traditional crafts. Thai Town is concentrated on Hollywood Boulevard between Western Avenue and Normandie Avenue. Thai Town sits within the boundaries of Little Armenia, which is home to Armenian restaurants, grocery stores, schools and churches. In addition to Armenians and Thais, the diverse residential population of the area includes Latinos and others, who on average earn $17,173 per capita, approximately 20% less than the L.A. County mean.

Highland Park is one of the oldest communities in Los Angeles. Situated along the Arroyo Seco, it boasts some of the city’s most significant cultural assets including the Charles Lummis Home and the Southwest Museum. In addition, there are many small, mom-and-pop restaurants as well as a sprinkling of well-regarded art galleries that highlight the unique creative output of the area. The resident population has a per capita income level of roughly $12,800, about 38 percent less that the L.A. County average.

MacArthur Park is the most densely populated neighborhood west of the Mississippi, at 23,000 people per square mile, and home to the largest numbers of Central American transplants in the city. High levels of poverty impact the residential population in the area as the per capita income level, at $9,983, is less than 50% of the L.A. County median.

We chose these places because of their potential and cultural vitality — in each there is a significant number of organizations and individuals involved in artistic and cultural activities unique to the neighborhood. And, because of their location quite near the central core, as well as their ethnic focus and cultural assets, all four neighborhoods share a great potential for attracting larger numbers of visitors than are now frequenting them. But they all are underdeveloped with, as the statistics above document, many residents having income levels that fall below city and county per capita averages. A local interest in community revitalization and our existing relationships with key stakeholders made it relatively easy for us to begin programming in these communities.

Cultural Tourism: Experiencing Local Stories

The various constituencies involved in community-based development activities do not always look favorably upon cultural tourism.. The difficulty often centers on the conflict between preserving that which represents the authentic culture of the neighborhood and its residents and the perceived requirement to satisfy visitors who may demand an experience designed for mainstream tourists. Balancing this tension requires that community members with a strong interest in maintaining cultural integrity lead the process of developing the cultural tourism program, like our partner in Thai Town, Thai Community Development Center. Organizations like this one can prioritize the preservation of cultural heritage and the mitigation of other potential negative impacts such as increased traffic and congestion. When employed with sensitivity, cultural tourism can provide great benefits to a community such as an enhanced sense of place, strengthening of dying traditions, community pride, tolerance and an increased sense of ethnic identity.

Chef Jet Tila making Thai BBQ as part of a “Trekking LA: Local Adventures in a Global City” Thai Town tour. Photo by Anne MacAulay Click here to enlarge

Our definition of cultural tourism incorporates two key ideas: The first is that cultural tourism is an experience by a visitor through which the diversity and character of a place is conveyed. Secondly, culture can be displayed in many forms, be it through artwork, historical monuments, food, music or an exchange of conversation. We root cultural tourism in people, their stories, their history and the resulting art, food, dance, crafts and architecture that are reflected in distinct geographic places. This emphasis on experience and interaction is supported by LA Commons’ mission statement, which, again, is: “LA Commons engages communities in artistic and cultural expression that reflects their experiences and serves as the basis for dialogue, interaction and a better understanding of Los Angeles.”

The cultural assets being targeted by our Uncommon LA program are largely concentrated in commercial districts and they have been identified through input from community members. We partner with the communities in all aspects of our activities to ensure that the neighborhood perspective drives the program.

Uncommon LA: Marketing Neighborhood Stories

In Summer 2008, people from around Los Angeles and beyond had the opportunity to taste their way through several of our target neighborhoods. Trekking Los Angeles: BBQ Adventures in a Global City brought them to Thai Town and Little Armenia, Leimert Park and Highland Park to explore the techniques, stories and traditions surrounding each community’s distinct style of barbecue. Our first stop took place at Avenue 50 Studio in Highland Park, where we enjoyed “barbacoa,” meat cooked over many hours in a pit in the ground, and listened to the sounds of Las Cafeteras, a Son Jarocho band. Our host for the second stop, in Thai Town, was renowned Chef Jet Tila, who not only cooked Thai Barbecue but also led an expedition to a Thai market and a performance by Thai Isan dancers. In Leimert Park, stop three, we were treated to a grill-side presentation by Louisiana native Andre Weathersby, and ate his delicious meat while listening to the sounds of the World Stage Jazz Festival. At our final destination, Little Armenia, kabobs grilled in old-style Armenian fashion were enjoyed at a community landmark, St. Garabed Church, while historian Sylva Manoogian told tour-goers stories of her life and of Armenians in Los Angeles. Our summer tour program is the cornerstone of our efforts to share the rich stories to be found in these neighborhoods with broad audiences.

Partnership with UCLA

In 2006, LA Commons partnered with the UCLA Department of Urban Planning to implement our Uncommon LA program, extending the impact of our community-based arts program by bringing visitors to the neighborhoods to experience the stories documented through the artistic process. Our joint program connects UCLA’s academic resources with local community members to create a model for cultural tourism with grassroots collaboration at its center.

UCLA Department of Urban Planning has a long history of examining the intersection between culture and community development. For example, in the 1990s, a report called “Accidental Tourism” was published by UCLA’s Urban Planning Community Scholars Program, which brought together a group of community leaders from different Los Angeles ethnic neighborhoods with graduate students. “Accidental Tourism” challenged the existing tourism climate in Los Angeles, with particular criticism of city funding of the Los Angeles Convention Center and of the Convention and Visitor’s Bureau and a suggestion to focus on community-based tourism as a tool for neighborhood-centered economic development.

Our current academic partner at UCLA, Professor Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, whose research centers on a range of urban issues, also has focused on culture as a community development strategy. She worked, for example, with a team of UCLA graduate students and local community organizations to map cultural assets, create public art and build community capacity in Los Angeles’ Byzantine-Latino Quarter. Many elements of this project provide the basis for her work with us. Through our partnership, we have engaged in a three-step process: 1) a cultural resource inventory for each neighborhood; 2) market research and data gathering; and 3) the implementation of a marketing plan that has included programming, public relations and publications such as our monthly newsletter and a Web site (http://www.trekkingla.org). The specific goals of the project are to: 1) increase exposure of and visitor traffic to identified cultural resources through a combination of print and Web-based marketing, public relations and neighborhood events; and 2) increase the stability of local cultural institutions by generating positive economic impact for merchants, their employees and the local residents who currently have income levels below area averages.

We anticipate the following outcomes:

• creation of a cultural-asset-based economic development model for low-income Los Angeles communities, which can be extended to other cultural districts in Los Angeles and beyond
• design and implementation of a comprehensive marketing and cultural programming plan serving merchants and organizations with limited resources for reaching a broad market base on their own
• increased access to resources and technical support through Uncommon LA for neighborhood merchants and cultural organizations, improving their chances for longevity and success in the local market
• addition of a wide range of food, art, entertainment and festival offerings reflecting the multicultural story of Los Angeles, and which suit a wide range of travelers and local residents seeking a one-of-a-kind cultural experience, product or interaction

Critical to the achievement of these outcomes are partnerships with local organizations, knowledge of local cultural assets and a marketing program that builds on these assets, including local stories, to bring visitors to the neighborhoods.

Partnership with Local Organizations

The foundation of all of our work, including Uncommon LA, is our partnerships with organizations based in our target communities. We place a very high priority on establishing mutually beneficially relationships with our local partners who often have community revitalization as part of their mission, i.e., Leimert Park Village-Crenshaw Corridor Business Improvement District or Little Armenia Chamber of Commerce. Our neighborhood partners also include community-based cultural institutions like Avenue 50 Studio, a nonprofit gallery and performance space in Highland Park. A final category of partner includes culturally specific multiservice agencies like the Central American Resource Center in MacArthur Park. While we play the role of facilitator, bringing funding and a strong program model to the process, our partners are the bridges to the communities, providing familiar locations in which to conduct program activities including tours, additional program resources and deep local knowledge. To ensure a strong collaboration, we work together with these partners to plan and implement all of our programs and share any benefits that come as a result of our joint efforts.

Identifying Local Cultural Assets

The bases for visitors to experience the culture of a neighborhood are the cultural venues, the people and the stories that contribute to its unique character. Thus, in the development of a cultural tourism program, documentation of these cultural assets is essential. The UCLA team has brought research expertise to bear on this task, surveying community stakeholders to determine which venues are culturally significant and then surveying these businesses and nonprofits to gather the data necessary for measuring the impact of our program. Specific factors to be measured include changes to the physical environment, volume of new businesses and changes in merchant revenue that have occurred as a result of infrastructure improvements and marketing activities. In addition, the surveys elicit merchant perceptions of where their customers are coming from (local, other parts of the city, outside L.A.). A comparative analysis answers questions such as: What community characteristics facilitate using cultural assets to generate economic benefit? What scale of impact can be anticipated by other communities considering this model? Where is increased demand/use of these neighborhoods coming from?

Marketing Neighborhoods

After identifying cultural assets, our task has been to develop a marketing initiative based on the cultural offerings available in our target neighborhoods. In general, there has been limited information available about cultural offerings in these areas. Los Angeles' large size makes it difficult for small organizations to effectively market themselves, so we are working to build a network of neighborhoods and organizations in order to provide them with access to greater marketing capacity. Our comprehensive effort includes marketing materials such as a brochure, postcards, monthly newsletter and Web site. In addition, we developed the “Trekking Los Angeles: Local Adventures in a Global City” campaign through which we’ve programmed tours over the last three summers, introducing these neighborhoods to hundreds of Angelenos as well as visitors to the city. The marketing program also includes a PR strategy that focuses on outreach to traditional and Internet media outlets. In addition to an ongoing presence in the blogosphere, our activities have been featured several times over the last two years in the L.A. Times and ours was named best tour in Los Angeles Magazine’s annual Best of L.A. issue in 2007.

Finally, at the end of the programming season, we hold an event called “Uncommon Angels” that honors the organizations and people that have significantly contributed to the cultural life of the neighborhoods. Based on recommendations from our neighborhood partners, for example, in October 2008 we honored “Mama” Laura Mae Gross, the 87-year-old proprietess of Babe’s and Ricky’s blues club in Leimert Park; Future Studio, a wacky gallery in Highland Park that is home to Chicken Boy; and, Faroh, a Thai Dancer and hairdresser from East Hollywood. “Uncommon Angels” provides a great opportunity for people from all the neighborhoods to get to know each other.

Even with the multifaceted marketing effort to market the neighborhoods, we are challenged to increase the visibility of the neighborhoods on a large scale. We are limited by our access to marketing expertise, which we are working to improve through requests for pro bono marketing counsel. Our dream is that the Uncommon LA network will become a force, controlling how their neighborhoods are perceived as part of the story of Los Angeles and effectively advocating for a greater investment of city tourism dollars in their communities.

This essay is part of the Community Arts Convening & Research Project, 2009-10, funded by a Nathan Cummings Foundation grant to the Maryland Institute College of Art. The essay was reviewed and selected by the project's Editorial Board: Stephani Woodson, Arizona State University; Amalia Mesa-Bains, California State University Monterey Bay; Paul Teruel, Columbia College Chicago; Marina Gutierrez, Cooper Union; Jan Cohen-Cruz, Imagining America; Ken Krafchek, Maryland Institute College of Art; Lori Hager, University of Oregon; and Sonia BasSheva Mañjon, Wesleyan University.

Karen Mack is founder and executive director of LA Commons, an organization dedicated to promoting Los Angeles' diverse neighborhoods through locally based, interactive, artistic and cultural programming. Mack served as a public-service fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, where she researched the role of culture in community building.

Original CAN/API publication: December 2009