Monumentalism—

Since 2020, Providence’s housing crisis has worsened with each passing year. While this problem is present state and nationwide, for the city’s 200,000 residents, the situation is amongst the worst in the country. There is a shortage of housing units as well as home and rent prices being at record highs.

On Federal Hill, my home, the rapid changes to the neighborhood, caused in part by surging rent prices, is a primary concern amongst its residents. Across the street from my own apartment, a luxury apartment complex is being built in the place of an unused parking lot— twenty-three 1-bedroom and studio apartments called “The American”. Its construction starkly contrasts the multi-family housing that defines the neighborhood.

Despite Providence’s feeble attempts to address this issue such as efforts to create affordable units on Knight Street and Atwells Avenue, it is nowhere near enough to fix the problem. On April 17th, 2026, Mayor Brett Smiley vetoed the Providence Rent Stabilization Act, which would have limited the annual rent increase for most apartments. It was vetoed due to the belief that it would discourage new housing construction.

I am less interested in photographing the large, obvious developments going on in Federal Hill than examining the changes that reveal themselves in the negative space in between. The subtle gentrification of my neighborhood exists in the background of daily life— the slow accumulation of greed that happens over time, year after year, rent increase after rent increase.