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 Making Exact Change |
Making Exact Change
Part Two: Case Studies Mural Arts Program
Basic Facts
Snapshot Meg Fish Saligman, a Philadelphian who travels the country painting murals and is known for big, intricate renderings such as “Theatre of Life” at Broad and Lombard Streets, is impressed with how sophisticated public art has become here. “You wouldn’t find better anywhere in the world,” she said. Murals crop up in all sorts of unlikely spots. At the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility in the Northeast, ex-convict Alvin Tull, a Mural Arts employee, is leading an effort to liven up a recreation courtyard on Pod 1 of the A Building. ”This is like a ministry for me,” he said. Mural Arts is expanding to other prisons, and is working with children of inmates. Murals often achieve landmark status: Jackie Robinson near Broad and Somerset Streets, Dr. J at Ridge Avenue and 12th Street, a homage to architectural ghosts at 22d and Walnut Streets. At 50th Street and Woodland Avenue is a wall called “Families Are Victims, Too,” a memorial to loved ones who died violently. Michelle Hundley visits often with her four little boys. She points out one face on the wall. Jeffrey Rushton. Her son. Gone six years now, a 10-year-old killed by a hit-and-run driver. “There’s a bench in front of his picture,” said Hundley, a nurse. “We like to sit out there. It’s comforting.” —Julie Stoiber, 2004[1]
Description History The Mural Arts Program (MAP) was conceived in 1984 by Jane Golden as part of an initiative aimed at eradicating graffiti throughout Philadelphia. Originally named the Philadelphia Anti-Graffiti Network, the initiative included a massive graffiti-removal effort along with a mural-painting component designed to engage adjudicated graffiti writers (who were typically low-income, minority youth) in learning more positive and productive ways to express their creativity. Golden was a professional artist who had also helped to found and direct the Public Art Foundation, an art program for young people on probation in Los Angeles. In 1996, the Anti-Graffiti Network was restructured. The mural painting component was reconfigured as a separate organization, renamed the Mural Arts Program, and given a “home” in the City of Philadelphia’s Department of Recreation. In its first few years, MAP worked exclusively with adjudicated graffiti writers who learned to paint murals, using their talents to bring beauty rather than blight to inner-city neighborhoods. Now MAP offers after-school workshops in mural making and community engagement with young people from around the city, focusing on at-risk low-income teens and including those who have not encountered the juvenile-justice system. These workshops complement and support MAP’s overall mission of partnering with community residents, grassroots organizations, government agencies, educational institutions, corporations and philanthropies to design and create murals of enduring value while actively engaging youth in the process. Mission/Values The stated mission of the Mural Arts Program is to:
Success and Change Goals MAP is committed to a participatory and respectful creative process. It is a gesture of respect to a neighborhood to paint a mural there at all, but the Mural Arts Program (like the Anti-Graffiti Network before it) goes beyond this and bases its designs on community wishes. It does not impose its images. MAP has this in common with other successful mural programs, but also has more respect for local residents’ personal desires than most. In intensive community meetings, MAP demonstrates respect for people who are largely excluded from government and traditional vehicles of public expression such as the mass media. Nevertheless, these people know what they believe and have strong opinions about what should (and should not) be represented on the walls of their communities. The Mural Arts Program also works to involve the city’s residents in the creative process, offering art-education programs at recreation centers, homeless shelters and other sites throughout Philadelphia. Defining Success The program defines success in two distinct but interdependent ways. The first, “quality,” is embodied in MAP’s long-term relationships with over 100 of what have been called the finest muralists in the country. As such, the program is very picky about whom it selects to design and lead each project. Its insistence on quality is also represented in the excellence of the artwork on the walls, seen as the physical representation of their community-engagement process. MAP’s other arena for determining success manifests through the individual and community relationships that are intrinsic to each mural effort. In this realm, the symptoms of success include the following:
Critical to Success Staff have identified program characteristics essential for a mural’s successful completion. They include:
Outcomes Since its inception in 1984, the Mural Arts Program has completed more murals than any other public art program in the nation — more than 2,500 indoor and outdoor murals throughout Philadelphia. This effort has brought art to the cityscape, turning graffiti-scarred walls into scenic views, portraits of community heroes and abstract creations. The University of Pennsylvania’s Social Impact of the Arts Project (SAIP) study of MAP also looked at MAP’s physical, social and economic impacts. Major findings included the following:
Nuts and Bolts Environment Philadelphia, the fifth largest city in the U.S., is located in the middle of the densely populated eastern seaboard, which also includes New York, Wilmington, Baltimore and Newark. One of America’s oldest urban settlements, “Philly” is as steeped in American history as it is neighborhood tradition. Originally built in the 1700s on the banks of the Delaware River, the city has spread out to include over 200 distinctly defined neighborhoods[2] with a population that is equally diverse (48 percent White, 43%, Black, 4.4 percent Asian, 0.2 percent American Indian, 7 percent Hispanic). The city’s population is relatively young and unattached with a median age of 35 and a community of singles that approaches 47 percent of the adult population. In 2000, the average household income was $35,000 and the average house sold for a very low $80,000, about one half the national average. The 2000 census also indicates that 71 percent of the city’s adults have graduated from high school and 21 percent have spent at least two years at university. The violent crime rate in Philadelphia is about four times the national average. A 2003 historical analysis of the location and social geography[3] of MAP’s murals by the Social Impact of the Arts Project indicates that murals created over the years have been concentrated in the city’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods. Sections of the city that have high poverty, low household income and high indicators of housing distress are all likely to have had many murals. Leadership For most of its history, the Mural Arts Program has been an artist-designed and artist-managed organization. The vision, persistence, stamina and advocacy that have fueled its successful growth have come principally from one person, its director, Jane Golden. This has been a strength, inasmuch as the source of the organization’s direction and decision making has been clear and unambiguous. The City of Philadelphia, funders and community partners all have placed great trust in Golden’s capacities and ideas, and her reputation brings extraordinary credibility to all of MAP’s initiatives. In recent years, the program’s rapid growth has pushed the organization’s sole-proprietor model beyond its capacities. In response, MAP has endeavored to create management systems and distribute leadership more broadly among staff members and its nonprofit board. Resources Budget: 2004 Budget: $4.4 million Development: City funding accounts for approximately 45 percent of MAP’s activities. The rest is provided by nonprofit organizations (26 percent), foundations (23 percent) corporations and individuals who support MAP either through a nonprofit financial intermediary (Greater Philadelphia Urban Affairs Coalition) or the Mural Arts Advocates. Both are 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporations. For 2005, MAP lists over 100 funders and nonprofit and public agencies organizations as supporters. Governance MAP is a city agency operating under the auspices of the City of Philadelphia’s Managing Director’s Office. As more funding has become available from nonpublic sources, MAP has increased its reliance on the organization’s nonprofit arm, the Mural Arts Advocates. Given this, the Advocates’ board of directors has taken a larger role in the governance of the organization. This public/private partnership allows the organization to take advantage of both the City’s resources and reach and the adaptability and flexibility of the nonprofit. Jane Golden sees this unique arrangement as one of the keys to MAP’s success. She feels strongly that “relying solely on either private or public funds is not a good idea; building (funding) partnerships is.” Partnerships Golden feels strongly about partnership as a foundation of MAP’s development and ongoing work. She feels that MAP’s status as a city agency makes collaboration and inclusion intrinsic to the work. She says, “Mural making is collaborative. Wherever we go — in the neighborhoods, with funders and the city departments — we cannot work separately. It would be impossible to do our work. ” Golden also knows that partnerships can be complicated but feels if you keep your eye on the big picture (no pun intended), then collaboration enriches the work. Over the last two years, MAP has forged a new partnership with the city’s Department of Human Services. With the support of Mayor John Street and the Department’s leadership they have initiated new programs for adjudicated youth and prisoners. Golden sees these arts-based partnerships as enhancing MAP’s ability to respond critical issues facing the communities they work with. She envisions their relationship with the city’s youth-service agencies as allowing MAP to work as a part of a continuum of care rather than an isolated experience “There is so much we can do together that we can’t do alone. When you partner with people and agencies with community-development expertise you are really starting to address the problems that plague cities.” Training MAP conducts staff meetings that are used for debriefing the mural and education processes. These meetings help the organization document and learn from its ongoing projects. For programs that focus on a specific population, such as adjudicated youth, MAP sometimes brings in qualified experts to advise artists and staff. As programs with the Department of Human Services evolve, Golden says she would like to take more advantage of some outside expertise for the continuing professional development of MAP staff.
Constraints MAP identifies two consistent barriers or limitations to the program’s development. The first is working within the city bureaucracy. Golden says, “Early on we were continually reminded that we were a small art component of a much larger enterprise. We were in a constant struggle to stay alive and garner needed resources.” She indicates that from 1996 to the present, the city has provided increasing levels of support for MAP. While this support has been essential to MAP’s success, it has also carried a price, which Golden describes as a kind of a culture clash. “The public sector is not used to being constantly challenged by a creative, entrepreneurial entity in its midst.” The other constraining factor has been maintaining a consistent and stable funding stream. Golden describes the funding pie in Philadelphia as “very small.” Given that MAP’s nonprofit board has not taken on a significant development role, much of that work has fallen to Golden. “The perception is that we get a lot of funding from the city so [funders] think they don’t need to support us the way they do other arts programs in the city and they are often changing their minds about what is important.” She says, “You need to steel yourself for that ride, but something always happens to turn it around. And it is usually the work itself that provides the impetus for new ideas and resources.”
Advice to Funders Jane Golden says the complexity and volatility that is inherent to community mural making requires a particularly stable resource base.
[Next: Case Study: Northern Lakes Center for the Arts] [Table of Contents] Notes 1. Stoiber, Julie, “Mural project, director have colorful history” (Philadelphia Inquirer, October 17, 2004) |
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