Living room
This photo series shines a light on the great divide between san francisco’s rich and poor.
Hello! Who are you and what do you do? Hi! I am Jana Sophia Nolle, a largely Berlin-based visual artist. Born and raised in Kassel, Germany, I first studied political science and anthropology in London and later completed a degree in fine art photography in Berlin. I occasionally work as an election observer for various international organisations, a job that informs my artistic sensibilities.
Tell us how the Living Room project came about. I began working on Living Room in San Francisco in 2017, investigating homelessness, wealth inequality and gentrification. When I initially arrived, I was shocked by the disparity between rich and poor – there was so much wealth against a backdrop of very visible poverty. The different ways people living rough survived on the streets was fascinating and shocking to me at the same time. I was impressed by their various improvised dwellings: how people without a permanent home created temporary protection on the sidewalk using found materials. Building upon my background in political science, anthropology and visual arts, I started to approach and interview various people I encountered on the streets, and to carefully document their lives, as well as their dwellings. I developed the idea of reconstructing their shelters and erecting them in fancy living rooms. My central question was how to capture the contrast between rich and poor, using photography, sculpture and performance.
Can you tell us about the wealth disparity in San Francisco?
In American society, the gap between rich and poor is growing and the middle class is shrinking. San Francisco is emblematic of this increasingly stark social divide. The giants of the internet age – Twitter, Google, Airbnb, Uber – are building bold new headquarters and offices in the city. Meanwhile, drug users and homeless people populate the streets, while employees race past them on $2000 bikes. There are 55 Michelin-starred restaurants in the Bay Area and 56 soup kitchens in San Francisco alone. Silicon Valley has one of the highest unemployment and homelessness rates in the United States.
Who did you work with to put the series together? I established access to both worlds: the world of the rich, with nice, stable homes, and the world of the unhoused, living in improvised dwellings. In the end, 15 homeowners and 15 unhoused people participated. Interestingly, I faced more difficulties finding participants with affluent, well-appointed homes who were willing to open their living rooms for me. Many people expressed concerns about the materials – that they might be dirty, stinky or infected with bugs. Others had privacy concerns. A crucial part of the project was building trust, establishing relationships and human connections with all participants.
Did you sense any guilt or discomfort from the wealthy people? They would always try to find out my intentions. In the end, either they were interested in art and motivated to be part of the project or they were interested in the social-political dimension. Some learnt about the homelessness situation in San Francisco through me. When I came into their homes to reconstruct the shelters, I had one condition: the homeowners or families had to be present. They would watch me and ask questions.
What kind of information did the people experiencing homelessness share with you? I spent many hours with these people, taking photographs and collecting handwritten diagrams, descriptions, letters, lists and notes. There were whole unhoused communities, people staying alone or in groups, in encampments, in different areas of the city. I also volunteered at the San Francisco-based NGO Coalition on Homelessness. After trying to understand the complexity of issues surrounding homelessness, I focused mainly on questions like, “Which materials do unhoused individuals use to construct temporary shelters?”, “What are the similarities and differences between the structures?” and “How are the materials used to create a safe place, for one night or an extended period?”
For my photos, I searched with the unhoused participants for things that were similar to what they were using. In some cases, participants offered old blankets, tarps or other things, which I exchanged for new materials. I never took their original shelters away. In exchange for their participation, they received food, supermarket vouchers, sometimes cash, and new shelter materials like blankets, tents, tarps, clips, plastic bags, camping gear or whatever they asked for.
What are you hoping to achieve or communicate with this series? Living Room is an attempt to raise awareness about homelessness and create a dialogue around issues of gentrification, income inequality, and the rising gap between the rich and poor. I hope the work challenges people’s perceptions of living space and wealth, of poverty, and of the importance of refuge and security. Unfortunately, art can’t solve problems or change society – at least not one work on its own – but it can wake people up. Maybe it will invite people to take action, or at the very least, recognise themselves within the ‘other’.
Will this project continue elsewhere? Last year I began researching the unhoused populations in Berlin and Paris, applying the conceptual framework of Living Room to both cities. How do wealth and poverty look different in the major cities of Europe, as opposed to the United States? What distinguishes the personal living spaces of Europe’s financial and educational elite? How do the structures and materials used by unhoused people differ? What about their needs?
Where can we see more of your stuff? Online at jana-sophia.com. You can order a copy of my photo book, Living Room, published by Kerber Verlag, on my website.