If you found yourself on Regent Street in Redfern last month, you might have noticed the particularly relevant window display at the Bearded Tit. The small street space was plastered with paste-ups by artist Emily Greenwood, proclaiming, “HOUSING IS A HUMAN RIGHT.”
It’s a reminder that often gets forgotten within the housing crisis discourse, along with the voices of people who live in social housing and who experience housing insecurity. But this neighbourhood queer bar is known for amplifying underrepresented communities and addressing community needs through its exhibitions.
‘Knowing Me in The Quiet,’ delved into the deep-rooted flaws within colonial systems and the notion of ‘home.’ Curated by Lilian Colgan, each piece “captures a sense of precarity and melancholy in the present.”
We spoke with Emily Greenwood about their work, ‘Houso Sweet Houso, and The Bed Zine’ and how their upbringing in public housing has profoundly influenced their artistic practice.
The exhibition examines how we shape our sense of self in conversation with the objects and spaces we occupy. How did growing up in public housing shape your conversations about self?
A lot of my work deals with my identity as a mixed-Tongan person, but the most impactful part of my identity is being someone who was raised in public housing. And I still find myself silencing that aspect of my identity, which is so important to who I am and how I approach things in life. So, I decided to make the work and the central thesis around that aspect of my identity. I feel like it’s something that isn’t spoken about in the visual arts field or art world, even in Australia.
That’s why the show’s concept made sense to me: A lot of my youth was spent at home [in social housing]; I spent a lot of time in my four walls, my bedroom, which I shared with my sister. We created a lot of culture from that: That was the inception point for my entire practice.
In any representation of public housing, I wanted to be authentic and from people who actually live in public housing. They never consider the people who occupy that space. Opportunities are not given to people in public housing enough to speak about their own experiences, and that’s what I get with my [bedroom] scene and with the work and the project.
The show also explores the deep flaws in the notion of ‘home. ‘ Can you talk about that in relation to your work?
I moved around a lot as a child. It was tumultuous and there was a lot of instability, and we moved house seven times, which is an important aspect of my history. Home, to me, is political in a way that it isn’t for someone who grew up in a home their parents owned. That is a political point, and it’s sad that for people who live in homes that their parents own – It’s just a place to relax, like a sanctuary, whereas when I visit my mum, it’s frustrating because there’s always going to be something going wrong: the fence is broken, and the owner, who is the New South Wales Government, isn’t going to fix it, but I have to live there without that security of a gate closing.
I think about like how my family came to public housing: My mum had no other choices and a lot of other people that I grew up around who lived in public housing and who I still know had no other choice. They were either refugees, fleeing domestic violence, or just had no other opportunities in life. There should be enough public housing available to every person in Australia, that’s how much I think it should be accessible.
So, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, but for everyone who grew up around us, it was a last resort. In my research, I found that all governments worldwide have to do this thing, otherwise there will be chaos. But it’s mainly to save face; having public housing shows that they are a civilized government. But now, in 2024, when we’re in a cost-of-living crisis, these services are no longer accessible to people who need them.
HOUSO SWEET HOUSO: THE BED ZINE (2023) adapted for the “Knowing Me In The Quiet” show curated by @girl_introjected @thebeardedtit
HOUSO SWEET HOUSO: THE BED (2023) BY EMILY GREENWOOD Concrete mâchè coating, upcycled milk carton and soft drink can frame. 160cmL x 90cmW x 101.25cmH
How did growing up in social housing inform your practice?
During those years, I was making these zines—little punk political manifestos—that were an outlet for me over a span of five years. But initially, with the ‘GRRL ZINE’ series, I didn’t want to speak about how I grew up in public housing. I was afraid people would read it and think I didn’t know anything. I don’t live in public housing anymore, but that’s my continued experience of the world.
I know journalists on TV who would never admit publicly to growing up in public housing, and that’s for their safety. That’s their right; honestly, because that’s the cards we were dealt. If you are privileged enough to go to university or have an opportunity when you are from public housing, then you’re not necessarily going to speak about it all the time because that could just also be traumatic for you. But I feel like it becomes continuously buried.
Making this culture is the only way for us to reclaim our identities. That’s why with this work at the Bearded Tit and with the concrete bed, I was like,” No, l don’t care what other people like have to say. This is my history.”
I want to just give my opportunity to myself because there’s not enough first point of view, and that’s inauthentic to me. That’s how history gets written, but that’s not how it should be remembered.
The bedroom scene on the street is wallpapered with the “housing is a human right” Why did you use paste-ups?
We chose paste-ups because we were trying to get the zine across. The zine was made with the bed, so I made them to reproduce information. Print is a very important aspect of visual arts because it reproduces information and makes it accessible.
The Redback Graphix Collective influenced my entire project. In the 80s, they worked with the striking steelworkers in Wollongong and the Wollongong Out of Workers’ Union. Their whole story influenced my practice and obviously speaks to my foundation in the punk and riot-grrrl movement.
I hadn’t done paste-ups in nine years, and even then, it wasn’t something I exhibited, they were just something I put up around my suburb.
Can you talk about how you thought about the bedroom space and its relationship to Regent Street and Redfern?
I was hesitant at first, taking up space where it is and talking about gentrification. I thought, “Is this contributing to the problem? Me not being from Redfern or not having history here and coming in and saying these things?”
But that is the point of solidarity. Everything that’s going on in Redfern in the past 30 years and the gentrification: It is unfathomable how a Eurocentric society would continue to displace Indigenous people from their homes. And it’s not just Indigenous people who have history in public housing. It’s getting worse for everyone. But the residents who are being displaced are never at the centre of the conversation.
[For example,] In my research, I looked at concrete and the materials used in public housing. But I couldn’t find anything from a first-person point of view. The people in that space, the actual residents, weren’t mentioned once. This is in academic journals about society and culture.
But that’s always how things are presented: “These residents living in this suburb in public or affordable housing, it’s just like they just live hopeless lives.” I think about my mum because she moved into the apartment she lives in now, which is the seventh place I moved to as a child. She said, “I’m not moving again like this is the place I’m living in. I’m living in this place like forever now.”
That’s my home, I spent half my life there. I feel frustrated that other people whose parents own their house consider it to be their permanent residence. That’s their home, and it’s always going to be their home. For us, there is always this fear, especially back in 2015, that we would get kicked out due to gentrification. Around the same time, the Sirius building was being sold off, which added to the frustration. These spaces are our homes; we’ve lived here longer than people I know whose parents own their houses. But occupying space is [a luxury] only available to those who can afford it.