“MURAL MILE” PROGRAM DESCRIPTION Our community beautification initiative "Mural Mile" seeks to transform the visual aspect of Livonia Ave. from its beginning to its end. The Mural Mile project brings together artists, youth, and community organizations to use art as a tool for social change. This project seeks to beautify neighborhood, engage youth in societal and personal transformation, and give expression to ideas and perspectives that are underrepresented in the public dialogue. Here an artist is selected to lead a group of students in our “Young Artist Institute” program who take our weekly visual arts workshop to create the mural as a team. Youth in our “YAI” program develop and hone their skills in four key areas—creativity; collaboration; critical thinking and compassion. In the after-school-year and summer programs, they master skills in art making to: communicate ideas; work effectively with others to accomplish common goals; make informed decisions though researching, analyzing, discussing, and finding solutions to problems; and to build awareness of and empathy for others. The students gather the logistics of the space that they will work on, this shows them how to measure and gather mathematical and scientific data. They then decide on a theme that deals with socio-economic issues that they community faces then research ways to solve these hinderances. After they gather this information they begin to sketch out their ideas as the instructor helps them to artistically communicate their message clearly.
Students then reach out to the community for feedback, overall approval and to recruit volunteers for its execution. The
COMMUNITY IMPACT The goal is to re-awaken a sense of pride and culture in their surroundings among the residents of East New York. An integral aspect of Groundswell's mission is to engage East New York residents, local merchants and community organizations in a process of learning how public art can inspire change and enhance understanding of valuing their neighborhood.This initiative is a mechanism to instill a strong cultural identity that makes all who reside, work and serve this community proud to identify with.