Los Angeles Poverty Department

Founded in 1985 on Los Angeles’s Skid Row by performance artist, director, and activist John Malpede, LAPD (1985–present, Los Angeles, CA) is made up principally of homeless or formerly homeless people. The group creates performances and multidisciplinary artworks that connect the experience of people living in poverty to the social forces that shape their lives and communities. The performance Agents and Assets (originally staged in 2001 and documented on video in 2008) reenacts the transcript of a 1998 hearing by the House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on allegations that the CIA was complicit in trading narcotics in the Los Angeles area in order to fund Contra activities in Nicaragua.

Los Angeles Poverty Department performing Agents & Assets (2001) as part of a Spanish language tour across five cities in Bolivia in 2008
Los Angeles Poverty Department performing Agents & Assets (2001) as part of a Spanish language tour across five cities in Bolivia in 2008, Courtesy of Los Angeles Poverty Department; photo: Henriëtte Brouwers