It all begins with an idea.

Community art installations (including murals) can be an excellent way to bring a community together and foster a sense of belonging and empowerment between residents, business owners, lawmakers and others.

This intersection mural was the first intersection mural painted in Tampa and is located in the South Seminole Heights neighborhood. It was created as part of their “Paint Your Intersection” project. The community put out a call to artists to create a rendering representative of the community. My design was chosen, and we collaborated to plan and paint the mural together as a community!

Children, adults, city council members and members from the South Seminoles Heights Civic Association all showed up to create the work of art.

Benefits of community art

Studies have shown that community art projects can benefit both individual participants and the group/community as a whole in a variety of ways including overall health and wellbeing, interpersonal relationships, cultural, social and economic impacts.

The following includes a list of benefits from various research studies completed on community art installations:

• Builds interpersonal ties and promotes volunteering, which improves health

• Increases opportunities for self-expression and enjoyment

• Reduces delinquency in high-risk youth

• Increases sense of individual efficacy and self-esteem

• Improves individuals’ sense of belonging or attachment to a community

• Improves human capital: skills and creative abilities

• Builds individual social networks

• Enhances ability to work with others and communicate ideas

• Increases sense of collective identity and efficacy

• Builds social capital by getting people involved, by connecting organizations to each other and by giving participants experience in organizing and working with local government and nonprofits.

• Increases opportunities for enjoyment and relieves stress

• People (esp. tourists/visitors) spend money on attending the arts and on local businesses. Further, local spending by these arts venues and patronized businesses has indirect multiplier effects.

• Builds community identity and pride

• Leads to positive community norms, such as diversity, tolerance and free expression.

• People come together who might not otherwise come into contact with each other

• Increases propensity of community members to participate in the arts

• Increases attractiveness of area to tourists, businesses, people (esp. high skill workers) and investments

• Fosters a “creative milieu” that spurs economic growth in creative industries

• Greater likelihood of revitalization

• Promotes neighborhood cultural diversity

• Reduces neighborhood crime and delinquency

• Increases individual opportunity and propensity to be involved in the arts