Houses with dreary urban facades covered in polka dots. A traveling dollhouse made from the remnants of abandoned homes. A dilapidated residence covered in ice.

Artists across the Detroit area are using the city's blight as their canvas, transforming abandoned homes into high-concept projects to draw attention to the homelessness, poverty and urban decay plaguing Detroit. They hope the ongoing experiment will shed some creatively inspired light on what Detroit was, is and could be again.

The work harks back to two decades ago when Tyree Guyton transformed a deteriorating Detroit neighborhood into a colorful, outdoor polka-dot art gallery.

Guyton rescued stuffed animals, sneakers and shopping carts from alleys and street corners and gave them a permanent home on the trees, houses and vacant lots of Heidelberg Street. But unlike Guyton's project, this latest wave of social art isn't centered on a single section of the city, and it comes at a time when the problems are just as dire, if not more so: Detroit has tens of thousands of abandoned structures, a budget deficit of at least $300 million and an unemployment rate two to three times that of the national average.

"It's amazing to see now the work that (Guyton) started 23 years ago kind of taking on shape and form in many different ways with many different people in this city," said Jenenne Whitfield, executive director of the Heidelberg Project.

Famous examples of social art include Spencer Tunick's photos depicting thousands of nude subjects at locations around the world, and Nek Chand's "Rock Garden," a vast sculpture garden in India. But the trend is magnified in Detroit because so many artists are zeroing in on the same subject matter and displaying their creations in high-profile ways.

Clinton Snider is one of those who saw artistic possibilities in Detroit's misfortune. The suburban Bloomfield Township resident typically expresses himself through painting. But these days, he's becoming known as the guy who built a miniature house from the remnants of abandoned homes.

Snider's creation _ called House 365 _ is touring the area with each "deedholder" hosting the little (about 5 feet tall) wood-framed house for a month at a time. It's currently booked into the middle of next year.

The house, which some mistake for a dollhouse, has become "a symbol for Detroit culture and how much abandonment there is," said Snider, who initially envisioned moving the house every day of the year, hence the name.