The Great Wall Restoration is Complete!

The longest mural in the world, now 35 years old, has been restored by for and with a new generation!

Read more about this historic moment in mural history here and here.

Spring Mural Project Unveiled Nationwide

Mural news has not slowed down in the past few months, but if you check the Tucson Arts Brigade and related blogs, you will see why I haven’t posted in a while. Here in Tucson the Tucson Mural Arts Program has been getting some traction. The Barrio Centro mural will be unveiled in June, and a second project "Inside the Overpass" will start the same month. 

In the Bay area there are a number of new mural projects. One that I’ve been following is the True Colors Mural Project Directed by Juana Alicia, with assistance from Cece Carpio

The mural will be unveiled Saturday, June 4th, 2011 1-4pm. 2111 Martin Luther King, Jr. Way, Berkeley, CA 94704

"This dazzling mural, created by the True Colors Mural Project, depicts a world that faces environmental, social and moral challenges, while expressing the dreams and hopes of a young generation as they prepare to become the future leaders and guardians of this planet. Patterns of color create powerful images weave their way up this three-story mural, which is illuminated on the interior stairway that faces Martin Luther King Jr. Way."

The Chicago Public Art Group continues to create new works, most recently unveiling

the Osterman Beach Comfort Station. This multi media project is the work of lead artist Andy Bellomo and artist team Will Nicholson and Brett Whitacre and made possible in part form the Chicago Park District for support. You can see work in Chicago just east of Sheridan and Ardmore.

Back in Philadelphia How Philly Moves under the direction of lead artist JJ Tiziou continues to inspire thousands. As you can imagine this is a project of the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts program, who continue to innovate and experiment with large scale environment altering works.

This multidisciplinary work captures the Philadelphia spirit through images of dance with mutiple opportunities for interaction and viewing of the work. The final work is currently being installed at the Philadelphia International Airport.

There is much more to tell you, like the now infamous MOCA LA Art in the Streets exhibit, perhaps the first serious exhibition of graffiti and street art in the United States. It's also been a really popular exhibit bringing hundreds of new people to the museum. It's great to see all of these projects coming to fruition. Send us your mural news!

MuralsDC is HOT

The national movement to Beautify and Unify our neighborhoods is underway in cities large and small across America. Check out the MuralsDC project. They have been replacing illegal graffiti with beautiful murals.

They write "The goal of this initiative is to positively engage the District’s youth by teaching proper art techniques, providing supplies, and a legal means to practice and perform their skill in a way that promotes respect for public and private property and community awareness. Site selection is based on areas of the District with high incidence of illegal graffiti as identified by the Department of Public Works (DPW) and other agencies. Each mural reflects the character, culture and history of the neighborhoods in the District and interests from the business/residence owners."

The MuralsDC project is a partnership between DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, DC Department of Public Works, and the DC City Council’s Committee on Public Works


Looking at the murals that are being created, these images have a fresh inspiring feeling to them. It's great to see our nation's capital reflecting the creative genius of generation Yes.

Giving Thanks for Community Arts Network in a Time of Innovation

This is the time to give thanks. I want to give a special thanks to the Community Arts Network (CAN). The site was archived not long ago, and will no longer be publishing new works. It was a terrible loss for many in the field. Art in the Public Interest/ CAN emerged from Linda Frye Burnham and Steven Durland’s work on High Performance Magazine (1978 - 1997). Thanks to the Open Folklore project (a joint effort of the Indiana University Libraries and the American Folklore Society) the CAN site has been archived, so we have a great encyclopedia of resources to draw upon.

We live in the Sonoran Desert, so this is winter garden time. We water new seedlings daily until their roots are strong enough to be transplanted to our specially prepared garden beds. As the plants grow we water them less and less, allowing for their roots to grow strong and reach deep into the soil.

Loosing CAN left me feeling transplanted, exposed. How will community artists and cultural workers inspire, dialogue and report back to one another? Many of us in the field simply can’t afford to fly around to conferences. We are not connected to large institutions, foundations or trust funds. Our base of support tends to be the community itself, and in times of economic despair, innovation is key to our survival. During these times our roots sink deeper into our neighborhoods where we are nurtured and watered.

Community animators play a unique roll in civilization. We have been here throughout human history, in various manifestations, the Griot, Kokopelli, Blogger. We work with neighborhoods, community centers, schools, hospitals and prisons, providing a place for people to advance their humanity, to tune into their emotions, their community and the environment. We work with groups of people to breath new life into forgotten or neglected places. It’s here in the grassroots we find the innovators, the experimenters, garage and basement cultures that have always produced the great art of the day. When larger and more powerful organizations appropriate ideas, concepts and movements it wipes the slate clean for those in the grassroots. It’s a benchmark, a sign of growth and success.

A friend of ours recently met with a community foundation. The guy she met with was very nice, and fond of her organization. He was familiar with the language and concepts of Community Cultural Development (CCD), but not with CAN or any of the hundreds of CAN writers who have joyfully labored in the field over the past 50 years. He coolly explained that the foundations resources would be distributed to several larger groups, and perhaps she could “collaborate” with them. My friend went on to contact each of the larger groups. The funds would be used to study “gaps” in programming. As she shared this story we joked about how not to become part of that gap!

So as the language, strategies and tactics of our movement have been appropriated, those with resources have figured out how to prevent resources from filling an ever widening gap. And this seems to be a national trend.

The fall out is that millions of young people are going without arts education, millions more are deprived of the ability to define the culture or cultures of their choosing through community theater, installations, orchestras, community writing and poetry projects.

There are many schools of thought on this issue as CCD expands beyond traditional art forms. These ideas are being discussed among communities of artist, teachers and scholars worldwide.

Artists and Scholars in Public Life meets annually with dozens of workshops and presentations to participate in. The National Guild for Community Arts Education also meets annually in various locations around the country. The US Social Forum is a massive open space for artist activists with a free wall, children's art village and my favorite the “Creativity Lab” . Alternate Roots hosts a five day gathering that is packed with youth centered programming, open space, fantastic workshops and time to organize. The 35th Anniversary ROOTS Fest 2011: Many Communities, One Voice, will be June 22-26, 2011 in West Baltimore, MD.

The landscape for CCD has changed since 2004, when Art in the Public Interest Published The State of the Field of Community Cultural Development: Something New Emerges, by Linda Frye Burnham, Steven Durland and Maryo Gard Ewell. For example in Australia there is an interesting debate about the effectiveness of CCD. Phoebe Coyne has written number of interesting articles, including “Community Cultural Development Is So Last Century”.

I'm not sure if that's the case, but I do know that for the past 32 years Linda Frye Burnham and Steven Durland worked tirelessly to keep us connected, informed, inspired and thinking about these issues. And for that I am deeply thankful.

Murals, Democracy and Arizona

Arizona is an interesting place, and as most of the world now knows, the struggle for cultural democracy is in full swing. In almost every town and city we find an attempt to define our collective cultural identity as the Arizona centennial fast approaches.

One example of this struggle is a mural painted in west Phoenix entitled “Mural of Unity” The 400 foot mural has been painted, tagged and repainted several times.
Some call the work graffiti – others see it as a visual representation of the human rights struggle revolving around SB 1070. The mural originally featured McCain and Obama, as well as local celebrities. Now artists want to change the mural to depict the immigration controversy. The mural controversy tells a complex story about life in Arizona at this moment.

I first learned of this controversy from a fellow attendee of the South West Arts Conference (SWAC) hosted by the Arizona Commission on the Arts (ACA). The conference took place at the Chandler Center for the Arts against the backdrop of draconian cuts to the ACA and the tragic murder of a much loved Chandler Police Officer Carlos Ledesma . Also killed were two suspects, apparently active in the local music scene. On the first day of the conference massive state wide anti SB 1070 protests erupted statewide, as thousands of human and civil rights activists took to the streets, even dramatically blocking I-19 .

The gathering of mostly arts administrators never formally touched on these issues, foregoing open space discussions. I understand to some degree. Those of us working in the public eye seek to be inclusive of all, to transcend differences, to stitch together a tapestry that represents the full diversity of the places we live, work and play. Still I felt a disconnection between the events of the day and building a sustainable future for the arts in Arizona.

Meanwhile murals of President Obama are being defaced nationwide. Atlanta, GA and Houston, TX are two examples. In Brooklyn, NY a mural of President Obama was defaced due to a different form of politics between the artists. This brings up the question of civic responsibility among artists, and the struggle between free expression and public space.

This is the ideal time to bring people together to dialogue about issues and using the arts to transcend differences. One issue that seems to come up is a sense of civic responsibility – we all belong to a community of people who cherish our freedoms. While some of the artists who created the Mural of Unity want to express their outrage with overt racism, other community members would prefer that the mural undergo a design and review process.

A few say just paint / buff it out. Questions of content, who will pay for the mural restoration and ongoing maintenance, are not so clear. The issue at hand seems to be whose voices and ideas will be amplified on the wall. Once again we can see how murals are a reflection of our democratic process, or perhaps lack there of. As a friend of mine once said – "any time you add a face to a mural you are bound to have some controversy". The dialogue and process surrounding the Maryvale mural reflects the state of democracy here in Arizona, and it will be interesting to see how residents resolve the issue.

One thing I hope artists will learn from this and the now infamous Prescott mural is that these issues should be resolved in the community design process, not after the mural is finished. While this can be an extended and frustrating process, ultimately it is the artists’ responsibility to lead these conversations and create a work of art that reflects the diversity of views that emerge. This is a double-edged sword, and one that can easily result in censorship or boiling down of content. At some point the artist may decide that it’s time to make a statement of principle - one that they will not step down from. I respect that and also accept that the public, or those that commissioned the mural, may not agree. Like all works of public art the artists should be ready for the controversy that may ensue, and embrace it with love and compassion. Mural making can be many things, decoration, wall paper, or social change incarnate. Whatever the motivation muralists reflect the cultures from which they emerge and are brave enough to do so in the public eye.

PS:
During my research into this story I discovered a wonderful group called Las Artes de Maricopa, a workforce development through the arts program. The art being produced is a beautiful mix of mosaics with hand painted imagery.

ARRA Era Murals Part 2

The era of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) murals is here, now. This is part two of the story of mural-jobs created with ARRA funding and the impact these projects are having. It is important to note that the creation of arts related jobs also means jobs for numerous other people associated with the creation of these projects, ranging from landscape designers, builders and cement technicians to engineers.

Santa Cruz, CA

The City of Santa Cruz has long understood the value of building cultural capital. They have created 15 murals so far through their redevelopment Mural Matching Grant program . It’s an intelligent move as they point out:

“Murals contribute to the overall success of the Redevelopment Project Areas through the creation of historical identification, district identification and unification as well as generally enhancing commercial areas and creating a “sense of place.” Exterior wall murals provide the added incentive to property owners of reduced graffiti as “taggers” tend to bypass walls on which murals have been painted and contribute to a graffiti free Santa Cruz.”

I found several examples of murals in Santa Cruz that capture the spirit of the day, a sense of excitement about a positive future that is lurking in the zeitgeist. Systems Mural Project is the brainchild of muralist Brian Barneclo and illustrates a holistic approach to mural making.

Brian writes:

“Systems Mural Project will explore the concept of interconnectivity via a 600 foot panoramic mural painted by San Francisco artist Brian Barneclo. Systems are found in nature (the water cycle) and also created by man (the government). What have we learned about sustainable systems? What works and what doesn’t? Should we revisit ancient technologies? Is the Industrial Age over? It is through this conversation that we gain an understanding of perhaps the most complicated systems of all, our systems of belief.”

Kansas/Oklahoma

The Mid-America Arts Alliance (MAAA) has teamed up with the Kansas Arts Commission and the Oklahoma Arts Council to fund two murals led by artist David Lowenstein. Murals are being created in each state. As with many of the ARRA era murals this project is as much about process as the creation of a beautiful final product that engages community. Included are job training, community and civic engagement and giving voice to disconnected people.

These projects will both be happening in 2010 and will give residents direct hands–on experience in the research, design, and execution of major public artworks for their communities. There will be a video documenting the projects, and you can follow progress on the project blog:

http://loewensteinmuraljournal.blogspot.com/

Philadelphia

The City of Philadelphia continues to be a leader nationally in the area of mural and art jobs creation. They launched a Creative Industry Workforce Grants Program with a half million dollars in year 1. Organizations are creating low cost artists work space, community centers and more.

San Francisco

Digging a little deeper one can find examples of murals as part of an overall development project that will translate into employment for several arts conservationists working in concert with experts in other fields. The City of San Francisco Department of Public Health AIDS Office was awarded 9.5 million dollars over the next 5 years to expand much needed services. They will also bring their facilities up to a LEED silver rating, saving them in utility bills over the long term. Their site at 25 Van Ness Avenue was formally a Masonic Temple built in 1911 and designed by Walter Bliss.

The Ripple Effect

There are several other examples I came across that don’t fall directly under the category of ARRA funds being used to create mural jobs. Each of these agencies did receive ARRA directly from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Street SmARTS’s

I was not able to verify if ARRA funds were directly used to fund this program. The San Francisco Arts Commission (SFAC) did receive funds via the NEA in the area of literature. I find it relevant in that jobs were created through cross agency collaboration, and are employing sustainable design concepts.

Another job creation through the arts program is in San Francisco. The San Francisco Arts Commission in collaboration with the Department of Public Works realized they were spending millions on graffiti clean up and the problem was only getting worse.

The solution was to match up artists with business owners to create murals. They had the wisdom and vision to create a program that reduces crime, creates jobs, beautifies the city, provides career development and advancement for artists while building cultural capital overall. 2010 is the pilot year, with 17 murals being produced.

New York

Groundswell Community Mural Project is based in Brooklyn, NY. They received direct ARRA funding through the NEA in the area of arts education. Among their many community based cultural development initiatives are the Summer Leadership Institute (SLI). This summer job creation program for 85 youth is broken into six groups who team up with lead artists and community organizations to develop job skills and create a work of public art.

Image: 2008 “New York City is a Rollercoaster”Acrylic on Cement, 600 Sq. Ft on multiple walls.

One common trend among cities using ARRA funds to create arts related jobs is a willingness to collaborate among city agencies. Leadership is key. The projects described here could be duplicated in any city. The best of these projects seek to seed new creative industry – providing one time start up funds that will lead to long-term job growth. One thing is for sure, more and more municipalities are using the arts in their overall job development strategies. These programs produce jobs that have multiple impacts on the quality of our lives and belief in realizing our dreams and collective aspirations for a sustainable, safe and peaceful future.