This is a blog post detailing the experience of creating a community mural with PB&J family Services in 2019.
From the very beginning, I visualized this project withPB&J Family Servicesto be all about fostering creativity and community and that is just what happened. I cannot express enough gratitude for the opportunity to have worked with such an amazing organization and group of people. It was an honor to work with the administration and clients in creating this mural for their playground in the SE Heights of Albuquerque, NM. Many thanks to Tashi Swierkosz of PB&J, and Nan Masland, and Cliff Youngblood of Bernalillo County for making this project possible.
I started the actual painting of the mural by layering the concrete block wall with white gesso and then drew out the design with a carpenters pencil. Measuring and mapping out the design correctly was the hardest part. After that, I outlined everything in violet acrylic paint and then started blocking in all of the colors and areas I wanted to have finished before the community paint day. Creating a contained, safe space for people to play with paint in was my number one priority.
Having never done anything like this before, everything was a new experience. I was nervous every time I left my house to drive there, because I had no idea how I was actually going to do anything or how it was going to turn out. There were so many unknowns and ways I saw myself failing, but I learned how to trust myself a little more each day I showed up and kept plugging away at it. My big push each day was to get everything done I wanted to get done for the Community Paint Day.
Of all the things I thought of that could possibly go wrong on that day, it didn't occur to me that the whole facility(and area for that matter) would go on lock down an hour after we started painting because of a DEA raid on a hotel located on the same block. An unforeseen circumstance! We all got called inside and had to wait out the raid for a few of hours. No one was allowed in or out. We all took it in stride and eventually got to go back outside and continue painting. It turned out to be a wonderful day with a beautiful sense of shared community and creativity. And a good story to boot!
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