Stuart Perlman Ph.D. Faces of Homelessness Project Collection

Collection

Identifier: SPC-2025-006

Staff Only

Content Description

The Faces of Homelessness Project Collection documents the lives of individuals experiencing homelessness and the surrounding environments in Santa Monica, Venice Beach, West Los Angeles, and Skid Row areas of California between 2010 and 2023. The collection is built around more than 260 digital images of oil-on-canvas portrait paintings of nearly 200 narrators, created by the donor, a clinical practitioner and artist. These paintings form the foundation of the project’s artistic and documentary approach.

Additional materials include biographical text files, digital images and video clips that provide further context about the narrators and their environments, and fieldnotes compiled by the donor. These materials present personal narratives, lived experiences, and artistic interpretations of homelessness, supplemented by perspectives from local community members such as a business owner and police officers, as well as documentation of the surrounding environment.

The collection also contains the donor’s professional publications in psychology and psychoanalysis, along with materials related to his artistic work, including books authored by him, press coverage featuring his project and activities, film screening flyers, and exhibition materials. The materials are primarily born-digital.

Dates

1981-2023
Majority of material found within 2010-2023

Conditions Governing Access

The collection is viewable in the Gerth Archives Reading Room. Series I Documentary of Homelessness consists of digital files that must be accessed on the designated computer located in the Reading Room. Requests for viewing those materials must be made in advance, please contact the Archives Reference Desk to schedule an appointment or for more details.

Conditions Governing Use

All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Director of Archives and Special Collections. Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections as the owner of the physical materials and not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained.

Stuart D. Perlman, Ph.D.

Stuart Perlman was born in 1953 and grew up on Long Island, New York. His undergraduate work was done at the State University of New York, Stoneybrook. He received a Ph.D. from UCLA in clinical psychology, and a second Ph.D. in psychoanalysis from the Southern California Psychoanalytic Institute. He has been a psychologist and psychoanalyst in private practice in West Los Angeles for over 40 years. He has been faculty at several educational institutions and has written many articles in psychoanalytic journals, and authored the book, The Therapist’s Emotional Survival: Dealing with the Pain of Exploring Trauma. His other books, Struggle in Paradise and Open Your Heart Through Art: Painting Human Souls and Their Stories are about homeless individuals, featuring oil-on-canvas portraits and their life stories and what happens to them years after being homeless.

Since 2010, Dr. Perlman has devoted thousands of hours to painting and interviewing the homeless of Los Angeles and Venice Beach and illuminating their humanity and pain. Over a decade and a half, he created over 250 portrait paintings of homeless individuals that have been seen in over 60 exhibitions. Through portraiture and interviews, Dr. Perlman notes that, "If we can see into their faces and learn their stories -- their hopes, dreams, accomplishments and fears -- we can no longer pretend that they don't exist...we can no longer look the other way." His professional life has been “devoted to breaking the silence” and telling the truth about trauma with his aim being allowing people experiencing homelessness to tell their own truths through their portraits and stories. The goal of the “Faces of Homelessness” project has been to illuminate the plight and trauma of those on the streets and note that we are all one experience away from trauma that leads to homelessness.

Dr. Perlman won the 2016 Los Angeles County Psychological Association’s Social Justice Award. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has also given him an award in 2017 for his work on behalf of homeless people. Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine called these works “Great Art Worldwide.” Dr. Perlman was awarded the lifetime achievement award of “Distinguished Educator” by the International Forum for Psychoanalytic Education.

The Faces Of Homelessness Portrait Project

The Faces Of Homelessness portrait project has been exhibited throughout Los Angeles, covered on Public Radio (KPCC), featured in print in Column One of the front page of The Los Angeles Times, and in other national and international publications including The Guardian (London), Taipei Times (Taiwan), Vanity Fair Italia and a cover story in the Jewish Journal. Dr. Perlman’s documentary about this project, Struggle in Paradise, won the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis’ Best Movie of the Year Award, was a finalist for best documentary at the Pasadena International Film Festival, and received an award from the American Psychological Association Film Festival.

Extent

203 Gigabytes (2 document boxes and 1,203 digital files (tiff, JPG, mp4, and mov files). )

0.63 Linear Feet (2 document boxes and 202.82 GB (1,203 files). )

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

The collection documents the lives of individuals experiencing homelessness and the surrounding environments in Santa Monica, Venice Beach, West Los Angeles, and Skid Row areas of California between 2010 and 2023. It centers on more than 260 digital images of oil-on-canvas portrait paintings of nearly 200 narrators, created by the donor, a clinical practitioner and artist. Additional materials include biographical text files, digital images and video clips depicting the narrators and their environments, and fieldnotes compiled by the donor. These materials present personal narratives, lived experiences, and artistic interpretations of homelessness, supplemented by perspectives from local community members such as a business owner and police officers, as well as documentation of the surrounding environment. The collection also includes the donor’s professional publications in psychology and psychoanalysis and materials related to his artistic work, such as books, press coverage, film screening flyers, and exhibition materials. The materials are primarily born-digital.

Arrangement

This collection is arranged into two series:

Series I: Documentary Materials on Homelessness
Sub-Series A: Portfolios of Individuals Experiencing Homelessness
Sub-Series B: Community and Contextual Perspectives
Sub-Series C: Fieldnotes
Series II: Publications
Sub-series A: Professional Publications in Psychology and Psychoanalysis
Sub-series B: Artistic Publications and Exhibition Materials

Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements

Born-digital materials are found in Series (I) Sub-Series A: Portfolios of Individuals Experiencing Homelessness and Sub-Series B: Community and Contextual Perspectives. Access to digital materials is available on a designated computer in the Gerth Archives Reading Room. Requests to access born-digital materials must be made in advance. Please confirm viewing arrangements with the Gerth Archives Reference Desk staff.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

The digital files were donated and transferred by the donor in May and June 2025 via Dropbox. The physical materials were transferred in July 2025.

Processing Information

The Faces of Homelessness Project collection was transferred by the donor via Dropbox in 2025. Prior to transfer, the donor reviewed the files to confirm narrator permissions and ensure content quality. Word files were normalized to PDF format for preservation purposes using Adobe Acrobat Pro. Access copies were created for onsite viewing in the Gerth Archives Reading Room. Original file names were retained with minor edits to ensure stability and long-term accessibility.

The collection was processed by Yoko Okunishi in 2025.