'Our Vibrant Lives: Nuestra Vida de Colores' art installation
'Sharing our love of community together'; 'Unifying as a community to create a sense of pride in our vibrant lives'; giving, caring, security - these were keynotes picked up on from a community listening session for an art installation completed over the summer with a team of 8 interns.
The project was a summer residency with ArtWorks for Milwaukee, Inc., an arts-based organization that hires high school students as interns to learn job readiness skills by working with a lead artist.
For this project, youth helped design and paint a mural, boulders for seating, and a story-pole garden with written statements painted by people living in the Burnham Park neighborhood. This park is a popular mixed-use park that attracts family and kids for recreation - mainly soccer and baseball, and is regularly booked for birthday parties, meetings and other gatherings in its recreational building.
During the first week of programming I watched as my extremely shy interns came out of their shells to get to know each other. I helped them warm up with teambuilding games and a talking circle at the beginning of each 3-hour session. During circle, interns were invited to share aspects of themselves to get to know one another. Every session a different intern took turns picking an insightful question to ask the group to reflect on so we could get to know each other. This was the first step they took to step outside of their comfort zones.
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| 11 boulders were painted as decorative seating lining a tree-covered walkway |
The second step was planning a community listening session for residents of the Burnham Park neighborhood to help conceptualize the mural by sharing stories. Before the meeting, they designed a flyer and we went door to door inviting residents to the meeting. Inviting strangers to a community meeting was the first time any of them had done this and they took it in great stride.
The community meeting came quickly. Interns designed and led this process, using our circle format as a template, and came up with a few critical questions community members were asked to reflect on: “What do you love about your neighborhood? What's one small thing you can do towards improving your neighborhood? When was a time someone in your community did something that touched your heart?”
Each intern took on a role and responsibility for the meeting – note-taking, choosing one of the questions to ask, door greeter, and story coach. After everyone in the room shared a response to these questions, story coaches helped community members translate their story into a simple drawing or sketch. Interns listened as community members looked at everyones sketches and shared what they felt was most important about the messages.
The community meeting came quickly. Interns designed and led this process, using our circle format as a template, and came up with a few critical questions community members were asked to reflect on: “What do you love about your neighborhood? What's one small thing you can do towards improving your neighborhood? When was a time someone in your community did something that touched your heart?”
Each intern took on a role and responsibility for the meeting – note-taking, choosing one of the questions to ask, door greeter, and story coach. After everyone in the room shared a response to these questions, story coaches helped community members translate their story into a simple drawing or sketch. Interns listened as community members looked at everyones sketches and shared what they felt was most important about the messages.
From the sketches they identified keywords – circle, safety, community, sharing, diversity, caring – and returned to these over the course of the week to conceptualize the mural composition. They were encouraged to use the actual sketches as much as possible in their design.
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| A painting made by a resident on an open to the public paint day in the park |
From there, we planned a series of community paint days where residents of the Burnham Park neighborhood could help paint by directly adding their ideas to the story poles and patchwork background on the mural.
Everyone contributed something meaningful to the project at critical points; from suggesting composition ideas, to taking risks with what to paint on the boulders. Everyone in the group was very shy from the beginning, and when the time came to unveil the project to the community each intern shared what they sincerely appreciated about the process, or a challenge they overcame: becoming more social, getting better at offering input, moving beyond their comfort zones by stepping into the community and taking on leadership roles; speaking in public, discovering a hidden talent for art!
The pride and joy in the interns faces was palpable during the community unveiling. It was a joy to witness this group come to life through the experience together, and fully take on the demands of a public project involving face to face interactions with community stakeholders as seriously as their own. I am very proud of all of my interns. Everyone indeed came to life, vibrantly, all the way to the end, and have shown that they didn't just end with the program; it is something they will carry with them beyond.
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| "Our Vibrant Lives: Nuestra Vida de Colores" mural unveiling |