Conversations at Sacred Heart
Host / Curator: Todd Madigan, Sacred Heart Community Service
Artist: Laren Leland
When Todd Madigan and the rest of the staff members of Sacred Heart Community Service decided to that they wanted to work with Laren Leland, they felt the choice made perfect sense with respect to their organization’s mission. They based their decision on Laren’s familiarity with San Jose. She grew up in the nearby Almaden Valley and has worked on collecting and mapping memories of this area. This pairing came as quite a surprise to the artist, who had geared her portfolio toward working in a domestic setting. When Todd and Laren first met in person, Laren expressed her puzzlement over their choice; Todd explained that he saw in her work that she “understood the emotional importance of home.”
Laren herself has always led a very comfortable life and never experienced deprivation of the sort that Sacred Heart sees daily. However, Laren’s mother was born in Italy into an impoverished family; “they didn’t have electricity, were often hungry, and literally slept with their livestock to keep warm in the winter.” Her mother followed the path of the American dream, and now both of Laren’s parents are, as she says, quite wealthy. Laren understands and is grateful for the privileges that this advantage has provided her. At the same time she has struggled her whole life “to make sense of class, money, wealth, poverty.”
Narrative and Notes from
Sacred Heart Community Service
I dressed up, thinking it was sort of an interview I was going to. I used the same entrance as the customers of Sacred Heart. I wasn’t prepared for it. I was surprised to find myself incredibly uncomfortable. Conflicted. On one hand I think this project could possibly be helpful, on the other I felt like a privileged person who was there to comment on a situation that I know nothing about. Though, I don’t think my project will be commentary… it will be more interactive than that. But overall, I felt like I was intruding. It made me overly aware of my own affluence, sparking in me something akin to shame.
I blundered my way around trying to figure out where I was supposed to go. Eventually I was directed to Todd’s office. I waited a moment. He arrived and I instantly liked him. He’s clearly compassionate, grounded, and very engaged in the mission of Sacred Heart Community Center on many levels.
He said that though their mission is to help the impoverished, they actually spend a lot of time focused on the affluent… because they try to bring the two populations together.
He took me on a tour of the facilities, meanwhile telling me the history, statistics of the population they serve, and stories. It was all quite overwhelming and engaging. I certainly felt my heart-strings tugged at.
They have a donation area, food distribution center, clothing center, and classroom/offices for education, housing, and job placement. Plus, of course, the offices for staff members.
Interesting programs they already have:
Immersion: a group of volunteers come and work a full-day shift– part of the day in the food section, part of the day in the clothing. Todd encourages them to be in the moment, to really be open to the interactions they have with the customers. Afterwards he leads a 30 minute debrief in which the volunteers speak of their experiences. He said that they always start with the positive, then tentatively mention that not everyone was friendly. He has a dialog at that point about our culture’s ideas of success, how people who end up as customers there may feel like failures, and how that feeling could lead to aggression as a way to take power back.
Walking Tour: a pilgrimage to different sites that are important to the history of the organization. They walk to the house where the founder started operating, to the original church that housed them, etc. During the walk they relate the stories. They point out things you can see in the neighborhood that speak to the problems they are trying to help with. For example, there are handball courts– which is a prison game– because of the high likelihood that people in the neighborhood will go or have been to prison. They talk about the meaning of the graffiti and the neighborhood gangs. They work at locating the issues in a physical place.
Homeless for a Day: an upcoming program where they will have affluent people actually experience parts of what the homeless go through. They will shop in the clothing section, put on those clothes, and be given a card for food at local shelters. The hope is that people will experience how hard it is– even for just a chosen afternoon– and will see how inadequate the help that is available is.
I’m intrigued by the three above programs. It seems that they are quite open to varied ways of having the different populations they work with interact. My project will be something like this-- more closely resembling a program, than say a painting on the wall.
One anecdote … on the importance of blankets: blankets are always fast to go because people don’t have enough of them. With less than one per child, children end up sleeping together– leading to poor sleep, inability to focus in school, and eventually major education problems down the road. Affluent people have extra blankets in their closets … and have no idea how much of an impact they can make on the less fortunate.
I talked to Todd briefly about my proposal for the museum. I mentioned that in it I had expressly focused on residencies, on wanting to work within a domestic space. He said that that was actually particularly why he chose me … because I understand the importance of a secure home.
My next step in the research for this project is to volunteer at the center. I believe my project ideas will surface as I spend time there.
- Laren Leland