Lani Maestro: Neon Installation

Downtown Eastside Dept: When artist Lani Maestro first walked through Vancouver's Downtown Eastside three years ago, she was shocked by the neighbourhood's poverty, racial strife, homelessness, prostitution and drug abuse, according to Winnipeg Free Press. Maestro, an immigrant from Manila, Philippines, knew she had to address the suffering of the Downtown Eastside in the installation she'd be creating for Centre A, a gallery in the heart of the troubled area and wAYNE GLOWACKI/ Manila-born artist Lani Maestro with her neon installation at Plug In ICA. No pain like this body , the title of a raw 1972 novel by a Trinidadian immigrant to Toronto named Harold Sonny Ladoo, suddenly came to her mind. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.