To Love A City
Type: Art Installation
Role: Project Manager, Urban Housing Solutions
Partners: Metro Nashville Public Schools, Tennessee State University, Southern Word and the Buena Vista Heights Neighborhood Association
Location: Nashville, TN
Status: Completed, October 2015
Project Details
Fulfilling a place-based need through the arts - The mural “To Love A City” is the product of a creative partnership between the developer Urban Housing Solutions, community members and students of North Nashville to use the visual arts as a form of self-expression and empowerment, skill-building, and an unique educational opportunity.
The mural features the works of student from the three area schools. Each school held a poetry workshop, where student wrote about what home is to them - those poems were then transformed into the mural by artist.
The project was created along the property of non-profit developer Urban Housing Solutions in North Nashville which had an 22-unit apartment under construction. Wrapping the full length of a construction fence, the mural became Nashville’s largest mural at it’s completion measuring 400’ by 5’.
The mural also serves as a greater symbol of the neighborhood’s revitalization. The mural location is a highly visible property within the community that once housed a deteriorated apartment complex — a former eyesore and liability to the community that will become the focal point for broader revitalization effort in the area.
Empowering Student Voices
The mural was based on student poetry from the zoned schools; Churchwell Elementary, John Early Middle School, and Pearl Cohn High school. The students were asked to created poetry about community. The poems were then selected by a community group and interpreted by community artist. The students had the opportunity to spend a day working alongside Tennessee State University art students and community members to execute the mural.
Later in the month students had the opportunity to attend or participate in a spoken word event. The mural therefore engaged the creative arts in three distinct forms – written, verbal, and visual — bringing together students from all three school levels. It would provide each of the students and community members the ability to think critically about what their community is now, what it could be in the future, and what their role should be in that transformation.
Video: Mural Dedication
The mural was an opportunity for the community to witness — and an invitation to participate — in the area’s rebirth. The accompanying video chronicles entire project and features student poetry.
Clarksville Ave Development project
The mural was part of the larger apartment complex at Clarksville Ave being constructed by Urban Housing Solutions. The complex is envisioned as an inter-generational, arts-inspired community with commercial space, artist studio space and affordable apartments for working artists, families and low-income seniors.
