In July to August 2011 I led a month-long project with a diverse group of about 15 teenagers from the Housing Authority of the County of Salt Lake’s teen program in order to create a mural about West Valley City.

The result is a bright, bold, colorful mural showing cultural landmarks of the city such as Hale Theater, the Maverik Center, the Kadheema Islamic Center, and the Utah Cultural Celebration Center. Surrounding these landmarks are foods and people representing the culturally diverse residents of West Valley City and plants showing the rich natural habitats in the city.

The Leadership and Resiliency Program of the Housing Authority is an after-school program for teens ages 12-18 whose families live in low-income Public Housing Communities. By participating in service learning the teens are able to become active members of the community and gain empowerment by helping others.*

Since the Program transports teens from all over the the county, most of the teens were unfamiliar with West Valley City. In order to figure out what makes the city tick, the youth first read through the city’s website, and paid special attention to details that defined the city’s culture and heritage. The youth spent a day at the Jordan River creating nature sketches. Finally, in order to learn the residents’ perceptions of the city the youth received permission from Valley Fair Mall to interview visitors about what they thought about the city.

Once all this research was complete, the youth and I created sketches to reflect what they had learned, visiting various significant locations throughout the city. The resulting sketches were cut out and collaged into the design which was then projected onto the wall of the community space at the Academy Park housing complex.  The youth then met the next two weeks painting the mural with me.

*source: http://www.hacsl.org/services/prevention-programs-youth

In July 2011 I received an assignment from the Sandy Central Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints to direct the construction of a float for the 2011 Day’s of ’47 Parade.

I helped to put together a committee and picked up a float base from Deseret Transportation. Using a modest budget of $5500 (included budget for warehouse rental), my committee and I created the float between February and July 2011.

As committee chair for the float, I created the original design for the float, and I took the lead of float decoration. Assignments were made for a construction lead (Brent Wade), a welding/mechanical lead (Pat Porter), a secretary (Charlene Clark), and a food chairman (Mike Raleigh), all of whom were critical in the success of the project.

As lead decorator I led 13 youth activities with eight different LDS youth groups. In these activities we created and/or installed decorations for the float. I also helped to organize activities for adults to help with the construction and decoration of elements of the float.

The float participated in the Sandy Fourth of July Parade as well as the 2011 Days of ’47 Parade.

All work on the float, including my own, was done as volunteer service for the church.

The float was featured in the Sandy Journal as well as the Church News (LDS)

From January to June of 2011 I met with the Magna Youth Council to brainstorm what makes Magna a unique, exciting town. The youth opted to turn the sketching and design work to me, so I took their ideas and came up with a design which was modified to their specifications and then submitted to the Magna Arts Council for funding.

The mural explores the rich cultural heritage of the township. Parade onlookers in the mural hold flags representing the nationalities of the original Japanese, Greek, and Italian settlers of Magna. The lead float in the “parade” in the mural is a pirate ship carrying a swashbuckling captain, representing the Cyprus High School mascot.

I met with the youth in July 2011 to paint the mural. The Zion’s Bank of Magna donated use of their basement as a project working space, and the youth spent a Saturday with paint and pizza attacking the four-by-nine foot canvas.

The mural was unveiled at the beginning of Magna’s “Night Out Against Crime” on August 6, 2011. The mural will then spent the next year touring various locations throughout Magna as a tribute to the heritage and culture of the township. The project was featured in the Oquirrh Times online newspaper.

I painted this school mascot mural in the lobby of Adelaide Elementary School of Bountiful, UT in July 2011. One of my most realistic children’s murals, and I had a lot of fun with it! :)

I met with students of Riley Elementary for 11 weeks from early January to late March to brainstorm, sketch, and create the tiles for the mural. Included in the project were youth in the after-school program as well as youth in the “Colors of Success” program.

-While brainstorming the past, students defined the culture of their parents’ upbringing in terms of food, clothing, technology, nature, language, beliefs, etc.

-In brainstorming the presents, students’ ideas for changing the world included recycling, working, and helping out the homeless (with detailed discussion about both short-term and long-term solutions for eliminating poverty).

-Finally, while brainstorming the future, students listed all the needs that people have, and individually came up with solutions of how people could meet those needs in the future (needs included food, water, nature, space, family, light, life, education, peace, etc).

After brainstorming, the students drew sketches using visual symbols to represent the different ideas that they had brainstormed for all three sections of the mural. For the past, students each handcrafted tiles as miniature relief sculptures of their sketches, which were later clear-coated. For the present, students were allowed to work in pairs to sketch their ideas and handcraft the resulting tiles. For the future, students all created sketches. I then collaged the ideas into a composition representing the ideal future of the Glendale neighborhood. Once the tiles were completed, they were handed over the school district’s tile specialists for installation.

Besides the ceramic mosaic mural, I also hosted two family art nights at the school to which parents and siblings of all Riley Elementary School students were invited. Participants at these events (over 100 attended each event) created handcrafted ceramic bowls and puppets.

This project was funded by an Arts Learning Grant from the Salt Lake City Arts Council with additional support by the Salt Lake City School District Fine Arts Department, Salt Lake Education Foundation, and Riley Elementary. Special credit to Bobbie Kirby, principal of Riley Elementary for helping to develop the mural’s concept, Lynn Green for assistance directing the youth during the project, and Rosanne Henderson for assistance and support through all stages of the project.

Thanks to the Salt Lake Tribune for their excellent coverage of the unveiling event.

Between the months of October and December 2010 I worked with students of Nibley Park Elementary School every Tuesday on this mosaic mural for the One World Café in downtown Salt Lake City. The café is run by One World Everybody Eats, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing food for the poor on either a free or work-earned basis. They also make their food from organic ingredients and use compost to run a nearly waste-free establishment. The youth who worked on the mural learned about and then visually interpreted those various missions of One World.

Thanks to Sugarhouse Journal, Salt Lake Magazine, and the Salt Lake Tribune for their coverage of this project.

This project was funded in part by a grant from Art Access / VSA Utah in connection with the Utah State Office of Education Special Education Services Unit. Extra thanks to Rosanne Henderson of the Salt Lake City School District and the Salt Lake Education Foundation for their invaluable support.

In order to share with the mission of One World Café with the kids, I created the following video in with Giovanni, the owner and chef of One World describes their mission:

In late November / early December I met with the teens of the Leadership and Resiliency Program of the Housing Authority of Salt Lake County to design a mural for the Housing Authority’s Chamber Room. With the Board on a two-week break for the holidays, we had a short window of opportunity to get a mural painted in the room.

The mural was drawn on the wall and painted in five visits between December 21 and the unveiling on December 30. The unveiling event was highlighted in the Deseret News Online.

I finished this playroom mural for a couple young kids at a home in Alpine, UT with my Beach Boys Pandora radio station as one of the main soundtracks to the painting.

This creative, colorful, and crazy mural resulted from eight one-hour mural classes with the youth of the teen program of the Housing Authority of Salt Lake County. The teenagers worked on the mural from brainstorming to sketching to painting. The mural was painted at the day care center of the Housing Authority building in South Salt Lake. The teenagers and staff were a blast to work with, and the mural turned out really fun!

Photo by Sergio Diez

Sidewalk chalk drawing, 11 x 49 feet large, in front of the Radisson Hotel in downtown Salt Lake City, UT. Commissioned by Outdoor Nation in order to welcome Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar on his visit to Salt Lake during the Outdoor Retailer’s Convention. Dominic Suazo of CreateAesthetics worked as assistant artist. Thanks go out to Rick Shafer for allowing use of his photo of Cedar Mesa as reference. Thanks also to Danielle for her help with chalking.

The project was shown on Fox 13 News Utah, the cover of the Salt Lake Tribune (and the online gallery for the article), as well as the online gallery for this Deseret News article.