June 17th, I believe it was Saturday in the afternoon. There is a skatepark that won't show up on your gps in Milwaukee, where people sweat, elbow a buddy after they said something stupid, drink and share cigs during dusk and oft until 4 am. Sometimes the lone wolf skaters will work on their footwork for hours, and sometimes other visitors collect in this spot at the skatepark with no address, but we know where it is. It's difficult to put into words the kind of solace that gathers here.
This photo was taken during a hangout-skate-party celebrating the fifth anniversary of National DIY. I was asked to document the event among other creatives. Underneath the highway's belly of an underpass.
Recently the spot has been reworked by two best friends who have vested time and effort into the project, along with many others who volunteered time and funds into the architecture of the place- along with murals and trash cans and a beautiful iron fence placed over top of the chain fence that blocks off the road. This wind tunnel where bruises are made and shins split, is a home with no walls.
José Esteban Muñoz. Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity. New York, New York University Press, 2009, p. 1.
