Such a striking facade.
“A decade ago, Reese and Samuels decided to turn their properties into refuges for persecuted writers from around the world. They made Pittsburgh a member of an international project called Cities of Asylum, and they raised money—much of it their own—to bring writers to the row houses on Sampsonia Way for two-year stays, with expenses and medical care paid. The first writer was a Chinese poet named Huang Xiang, who had spent twelve years in jail and labor camps for taking part in the Democracy Wall movement. The abuse he endured had been so bad that, when he came to Pittsburgh in 2004, he locked himself in the former crack house and wouldn’t go out. Soon, though, he was up on a ladder, writing his poems in beautiful calligraphy across the exterior walls: an act of self-liberation that turned his banned writing into a startling sight on a street that still looks like the set for an August Wilson play.”
An interesting approach to urban renewal.
