"Don't be scared; just show yourself"

There is a growing body of research and hands-on work in the area of art-making, neighborhood development and community engagement.  In that vein, I wanted to share a story from Madison's 77 Square (by my journalistic compadre Lindsay Christians) about an innovative street art camp for teens.

The camp, run by Drew Garza and Scott Pauli (who have a local design business, Art & Sons) and co-conceptualized with Phil Busse, teaches kids cutting-edge skills in computer-aided graphic design, yet also uses old-fashioned paste-up techniques on the sides of local buildings.

At the same time the kids are building technical skills, they're expressing themselves and engaging with thorny social issues like racism and environmental damage--issues raised by the teens themselves, not foisted on them by adults.  As one of the kids quoted says, "Don't be scared. Just show yourself, be yourself."  To encourage people to seek out these works, an art "scavenger hunt" was organized.

The article, with accompanying video, is definitely worth a read.  Hats off to Busse, Garza and Pauli for designing such an intriguing program for teens, and to the City of Madison for helping support it through a BLINK! grant (small grants for temporary art projects).