Good practice:

Murals for Communities – Creative Europe project

Mural Art is a form of street art that uses its spatial and social surroundings to derive its meaning and messages. This art form does not have a goal to produce works that are meaningful by themselves. They focus on altering physical environments in which they are created, and by doing so, produce an effect within the minds of people and communities that are part of these environments through social messages they depict. The art form is easily linked to graffiti culture(s), by itself a product of urban cultures since the second half of the 20th century, as well as ‘tagging’: the social messaging activities of gangs that, in many cases, evoke negative connotations to their surroundings.
Murals are able to use the abilities for social messaging on quite opposite manners as well. When facilitated properly, these works are able to positively capture and express feelings, stories and histories of people, local communities and surroundings (e.g. districts and buildings), becoming a powerful tool to bind peoples within and among communities. The art form can become a strong actor for community building processes, stimulating well-being, helping to fight feelings of loneliness and marginalisation of communities. Moreover, when created by highly capable artists, Murals are able to turn empty and abandoned surfaces into visually stimulating pieces of art, adding to the general sense of ‘beautification’ of a Mural’s surroundings.

The Pandemic - Contingency Plan The final leg of MFC in Ireland was scheduled for August 5th - 15th 2020. In March, the near-global lockdown forced the management team to develop a contingency plan in response to the global health crisis.

The project reached its goals by defining and setting up a Programme Package consisting of 3 interlinked Murals for Communities Programmes: 1) set up a Mural Artist-in-Residency programme in the Project Partners’ cities linked to their Mural Festival seasons of 2019 and 2020, 2) created mural artworks through interaction and co-creation 3) stimulated the self-efficacy of participating artists by exploring the interaction possibilities between Mural artists, local businesses and wall owners.

The project partners have produced a Murals for Communities (MfC) Guidebook which details this approach and guides other managing authorities wishing to engage with communities through Mural Art. Galway – Europe City of Culture 2020 is now working with our project partners to implement the MfC approach to community engagement as part of their cultural activities in the 2020 program.
Learnings: • The use of Mural Art in community engagement can be an effective tool when reaching out to marginalised and disadvantaged communities.
• Including local businesses in the process requires a different approach, which is focused around capacity building for the Mural Artist Community
Stakeholders:
• Waterford City & County Council (WCCC) and associated partner Waterford Walls (WW), in Waterford, Ireland. WCCC is the Lead Partner of the project.
• The Street Art Foundation (SAF) in Heerlen, the Netherlands.
• The Kaunas University of Technology
• Creative Europe