Spike Johnson Friends in Low Places

Friends in Low Places is a photographic project documenting the lives of a group of U.S. veterans who exist beneath Houston’s Downtown in a series of caves, tunnels, and alcoves that line the bayou and nestle under the highways. The percentage of veterans in the homeless community is double the representation of veterans in normal society. Around 300,000 veterans sleep rough every night in the United States, around 1 million will have been homeless at some point in 2012. Wrestling with psychological problems, arrest warrants, and an inability to integrate into civilian society, they group together for companionship, seeking solace in a hidden existence. Together they build shelters from scraps of tarpaulin or scuttle through holes in concrete bridges into the caves beyond. They share the burden of addiction, self-medicating the pain of old injuries, or drowning memories in a blur of alcohol or crack cocaine.