Mural Assignment

The city of Philadelphia has over 3,000 murals throughout its various neighborhoods. While it is fascinating to appreciate the pure artistry and brilliance in how the murals are created, many people tend to overlook the underlying meaning as to why they are there. Depending on each neighborhood, the meaning of each mural varies. What makes the murals so amazing is to understand that each community comes together in order illuminate an issue or problem that they have or are trying to overcome.

Throughout the semester, we have talked about this idea of civic media, which according to MIT can be defined as, “any use of a medium that empowers a community to engage within and beyond the people, places, and problems of their community”. According to this definition, we can clearly see a correlation between civic media and murals that cover the walls of Philadelphia. In this case, the mediums are the murals and as stated before they are used to empower their respective communities and neighborhoods in order to overcome conflicts that hinder them.

A perfect example of how these murals have brought about positive changes is in the mantua neighborhood in west Philadelphia. In her article On Philly’s Walls, Murals Painted With Brotherly Love, Lauren Silverman discusses how two murals improved the lives of its residents. As the story goes, the community requested that the walls of two apartment buildings across from a field with glass shards and tires be painted with murals. After a short time the field no longer was filled with glass and tires. Rather, it became a park where residents of the community could enjoy some open space within the city boundaries.

As someone who is from the suburbs of Philadelphia I must admit I really wasn’t aware of the powerful meanings behind the murals that fill the city neighborhoods. I was always aware of them and extremely fascinated when I would see them in the city. Yet, it wasn’t until I took this class on civic media that I began to understand what they truly mean. I really enjoyed our class trip where we got to visit some of the murals. Even though we only got to see a few of the several thousand that paint the city, it was a great experience. Now, I plan on discussing some of the murals that stuck out to me the most.

To start, a mural that really drew my attention was The Peace Wall in grays ferry. I found this mural so compelling because one of my fathers coworkers grew up in grays ferry at a time when racial tensions were high. To give a little background, grays ferry is a racially mixed community that has had issues with racial violence. As the violence peeked in 1997, members of the community realized that something needed to be done in order to restore the relationships between the diversified races. I found this mural so captivating because after finding out about the issues within the community the picture that it painted was clear. It showed hands of all different races coming together to remind the community that they should be united in peace.

Moving on, another mural that I found to be interesting was FACT found at 55th and Woodland. After doing some research, I found out that FACT stands for the fathers and children together program. The goal of the program is to help fathers who are incarcerated connect with their children. By doing so, the idea is that the fathers will encourage their children to pursue education and avoid trouble. The mural, as it stands, reveals the importance of the bond between fathers and their children.

The Bridging the Gap mural located at 5741 Woodland Avenue shed light on the animosity that existed between African born and African American born residents in the community. More specifically, bridging the gap brought together members of both backgrounds to display their relationship building efforts. The community members worked with artist Willis Humphrey in an effort to design and paint a collective mural about overcoming conflict, perceived stereotypes and cultural healing.

Finally, the last mural that I want to touch on is Our City, Our Vets located at 4129 Woodland Ave. Artists William Humphreys and Phillip Adams designed the mural for military veterans who were returning to the city. Both Humphreys and Adams hosted a series of events including discussions and painting activities in order to build camaraderie for troops struggling from the war. Furthermore, the project helps build a network of troops who want to connect with fellow veterans to share their stories from Iraq. The mural stands as a thank you for the veterans and intends to send the message that they will always have a home in Philadelphia.

Personally when I think of mass media the Michael Brown case immediately comes to mind. Why? Because no matter where you were in the world chances were you were seeing constant updates about the case either on the news or Internet. However, when it comes to the murals in Philadelphia it really isn’t like that at all. Within the city of Philadelphia these murals clearly all represent the idea of civic media. It truly is a culmination of communities within the city of Philadelphia engaging in way to better their neighborhoods. These murals aren’t broadcasted nationally. Rather, it is more about individuals within their respective communities attempting to better their neighborhoods. In this way, we can certainly see how this differs from mass media.