Throughout the semester, we have worked hard to define sustainability and understand it’s role in art and the urban environment. Public art often serves as an extremely powerful form of communication and motivation for social movements and the empowerment of others. There is a deep interconnection between public art and social sustainability, as public art can serve as the grounds or the means to achieve such a thing.
In many cases, public art is used to provide a common area or a safe space for those in need of one. We have seen a number of groups and public art projects that work in this way, including Patrick Rowe’s ‘Mobile Print Power’. Rowe told us that he considers art to be a trans-formative and participatory thing, and with this in mind, he created public spaces that facilitate social empowerment and engagement. He engaged members of marginalized and under-represented communities and gave them a sense a strong sense of power and will over their environments. He used placemaking and creativity to engage and empower individuals and ensured that the art he created was created by and with the communities he worked to represent.
In other cases, public art is used to fight for social causes or educate and empower social groups. Project Row Houses, for example, encourages artists to “extend their practice” outside of the studio and into communities. They are a proponent and supporter of community oriented public art in the Third Ward of Houston and are dedicated to empowering local artists, young families, and other groups in need of representation in the Third Ward. Other groups, such as the Green Bronx Machine, have different takes on social sustainability. This organization educates youth in the Bronx and works to teach students the important of fresh food and produce and self sufficiency.
Learning about public art and its relation to social sustainability has given me a new way to look at communities and the work that I do. I have always been an active member in the communities I’ve been a part of, but over the past two years, the way I look at my role in my communities has been and continues to be expanded. I began working in Camden last year with a neighborhood organization focused on improving public safety. I have learned quite a bit about sustainability, the intricacies of communities, and the importance of empowerment. What we have studied in class has inspired me to think more creatively about how we might achieve our goals as an organization. Though our goal is to improve public safety, we are essentially working to create a more socially sustainable environment for our community. We’ve connected with a number of organizations in the city to do so, including members of our neighborhood: The Center for Environmental Transformation, and Camden Fireworks. With these great organizations, we plan on creating more public gardens, improving green space, and creating décor and murals for the neighborhood. Before this class, I would have supported these projects completely, but I don’t think that I would have fully grasped the social impact that they will have on the neighborhood.
Public art is one of the most powerful ways we advocate for socially sustainable causes, and it often represents and strengthens the voices of communities and groups in need. Because of this class and especially because of this unit, my way of looking at my work and public art has changed significantly.
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