Qualified Opportunity: Walking Tour

Los Angeles-based artists Harrison Kinnane Smith and Hunter Baoengstrum lead a walking tour of West Adams, stopping at sites tied to the neighborhood's history of legal advocacy for Black homeownership.

The tour draws comparisons between present-day investment and development in the Jefferson Park Historic Preservation Overlay Zone and the adjacent West Adams Qualified Opportunity Zones.

Harrison Kinnane Smith is an artist based in Los Angeles. His collaborative work and site-specific interventions critique public institutions and financial systems. He has been published by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and included in exhibitions at François Ghebaly, Meier St/ and Frankfurt Ordorica galleries in LA; Romance Gallery and the Mattress Factory Museum in Pittsburgh; and Emmelines and SculptureCenter, NYC. Smith is a Co-Founder of PlaceHolder Gallery, LA and Affiliated Faculty and Co-Director of the Morning Star Research Center for the Afterlife of Slavery. He holds a BA from Yale University and an MFA from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Hunter Baoengstrum (b. 2000, Huntington Beach, CA) is an artist, urban planner, and cyclist who lives and works car-free in Los Angeles. As the founder and general manager of the City of Los Angeles Bureau of Infrastructure Inspections, Baoengstrum researches and leads critical, site-specific group bike rides and walks that exploit loopholes in public space to survey the financial, cultural, and historical implications of technocratic planning.

Commissioned by LAND, Harrison Kinnane Smith: Qualified Opportunity examines how the federal Opportunity Zone program, which grants private investors tax deferral and exemption incentives, shapes real estate use and ownership in the West Adams neighborhood of South Los Angeles.

The project, comprised of a new publication and three public programs, focuses on Fundrise, one of the world's largest real estate private equity investors and platforms, and its instrumentalization of Qualified Opportunity Zones. The artist’s book, titled Qualified Opportunity: Fundrise Commercial Investments in West Adams, Los Angeles (2017-2026), features photographs and real estate data detailing every commercial property purchased by Fundrise in the Jefferson Boulevard corridor of central Los Angeles since the Opportunity Zone program began in 2017.

Alongside the publication, Harrison Kinnane Smith: Qualified Opportunity presents three public programs: a book launch conversation with artist Cauleen Smith, a walking tour of historic West Adams sites with artist Hunter Baoengstrum, and a lecture from researcher and architect Masha Hupalo, whose work explores how financial technology has impacted urban planning and reshaped systems of real estate ownership in the 21st century.

Qualified Opportunity is commissioned by Los Angeles Nomadic Division (LAND) and organized by Christopher Mangum-James, LAND deputy director, and Astrid Kayembe, LAND operations coordinator.

This project is funded through the Mohn LAND Grants established by Pamela and Jarl Mohn. The initiative provides Los Angeles-based artists resources and support to present site-responsive, transdisciplinary work across Los Angeles County.

LAND’s 2026 projects are supported by the LAND Artist Fund with lead support from Perenchio Foundation, Offield Family Foundation, and Karyn Kohl. Generous support is provided by the Fran and Ray Stark Foundation, Ruth Arts, Ben Weyerhaeuser, and the Patrick and Aimee Butler Family Foundation. Additional support is provided by Berry Stein, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Department of Arts and Culture, Pamela and Jarl Mohn, Brenda Potter, The Goodman Family Foundation, the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the San Francisco Foundation, and LAND’s Nomadic Council.

LAND is a member of and supported by the Los Angeles Visual Arts (LAVA) Coalition.

LAND is a member-supported organization. Keep LAND programs free for all by becoming a member today at nomadicdivision.org.

Feature image by Harrison Kinnane Smith.