(upbeat music) - Funding for "NJ Spotlight News" provided by RWJ Barnabas Health.

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(rousing music) From NJ PBS Studios, this is "NJ Spotlight News" with Briana Vannozzi.

- Hello, and welcome to a special edition of "NJ Spotlight News".

I'm Joanna Gagis.

We continue our journey through public art across the state with our digital documentary series "Painting Community".

This episode explores a newer community art program called "The Golden Life", which celebrates women who live and work in the city, spotlighting their joy, pride, and resilience.

Let's take a look.

(upbeat music) - [Armisey] You have to stop thinking that Newark is the boogeyman of New Jersey.

Stop!

Come here, see what's going on.

We have good and bad.

There's good and bad in the suburbs, too.

(horn honking) - Welcome to public art.

(Armisey laughing) (horn honking) (upbeat music continues) Newark has such a long history as a creative city, and to be able to make that visible and put it as big as we can on a wall is a really special thing.

We're all one community, all working together.

- And that's important, is day and time.

There's a lot of stigma associated with Newark.

People kind of go into, like, certain situations or areas or communities with this preconceived notion.

What you need to do is appreciate the people who are there, and acknowledge them.

The more I did that, the more I felt connected, which is kinda odd coming from somebody who's, like, from Brooklyn.

But I felt like I was home because I was seen as an artist.

- In some ways, it feels like the biggest small town, particularly within the art scene.

It's a really special place to be.

(bright music) I'm a photographer and Armisey is a painter.

We're friends first.

We work together, and I feel like she's somebody that saw strength in me.

- Mm-hmm!

My work is straight about women, period and stop.

Women of color, portrayed in positions of divinity.

- [Rachel] I entered this muralism public arts space originally documenting graffiti and street art.

The first mural that I was brought into as a lead artist was with Armisey on "The Golden Life".

So, it's a really special thing.

Everything changed all at once and I took on a new role.

Now, in addition to an educator and a photographer, I'm also a public artist.

- A lot of murals are very prescribed.

Like, "These are the themes that you have to address in a mural."

When this opportunity came along, I was like, "Can I do whatever I want?"

And they were like, "Yes."

And I was like, "Really?"

I said, "So I can do a mural that's strictly about women of color and girls, and use this color scheme, and put nimbuses behind them?"

They're like, "Yes."

I was like, "Rachel!"

(both laughing) It was almost like a dream come true.

She's seen my work, I've saw her work.

I was like, "This is a no-brainer, here."

- We are aligned on our vision and the underlying meaning behind things.

(Rachel laughing) - Gonna make me- - I know!

- Get me off this clip!

- I was like, "I can't look at you!"

(Rachel laughing) - Such a sweetheart!

(bright music) - [Rachel] Because it is a high-trafficked area, the mural site was identified by the City of Newark as in need of beautification and safety and cleanup.

- "The Golden Life" mural is really important because it spans generations of women.

To talk about the power of women of color, that is really important, especially for Black and Brown women and girls in an age that isn't necessarily kind to them.

- [Rachel] And we combined both high-resolution prints and painted elements to create this multi-facade installation.

It features 14 women and girls of all ages, from toddler through elder.

And all of the women that you see here, and girls, are connected to the mural site.

So, they either live or work in the community.

- [Armisey] "The Golden Life" just means internal agency and light and how you share that with others.

I feel golden when I'm teaching student with developmental disability, and a smile comes across their face when they feel that they get something.

(upbeat music) - Because this is an area that is so well-used and has been neglected for so long, we wanted to highlight real lives of real women and really center their contributions and make people aware of how special ordinary people are.

The people in our mural are wearing regular clothes.

They're not posed specifically.

They were prompted with a couple of questions about, "What makes your life golden?

When do you feel the best?"

And then, my job as the photographer was to try to capture that feeling, that emotion in the portrait.

We wanted to highlight the beauty in the everyday and the radiance of the everyday.

And that's intentional.

We could have honored historical people, famous people, and we didn't want that.

We wanted real people who would get to see themselves.

And I think it's our way of countering the hate and division that we seemed inundated by these days.

So, we're gonna put it up on the wall, 12 feet tall, as tall as we can- - Ladders.

- As tall as we can do.

- Scissor lifts.

- Yep.

- How can we say it's okay to be who you are?

Embrace your golden side.

Embrace the warmth and the power of that in yourselves.

(bright music) The Nimbus is one of those kinda universal symbols that highlights saints or people who are of higher stature.

If you look at religious paintings, they usually denote saints or gods.

And I wanted to include this in the mural because it's connected to my personal work and how I talk about the power and the divinity of Black and Brown women.

(bright music continues) This is how I perceive my Blackness and the trials and tribulations and the joys of being a Black woman.

(bright music continues) We're very passionate about what we do and how we serve the community.

- [Rachel] So, accessibility is really important to both of us.

We both work with students who are disabled.

- [Armisey] We though it was important to try to get everybody that we could in the mural.

- My philosophy on access is that when you make something inclusive for one population, it becomes more inclusive for all populations.

The photos were taken during our workshop, which was at Newark Public Library, and it was open to anybody who wanted to come and participate.

A local young girl, Zora Stover, she's blind.

I talked to her about the prompt, which was, "What makes you feel golden?"

And she had this look on her face and she just looked to the light and she said, "I can feel the light on my face."

And this is the moment that we captured here.

This one will live in my memory as the peak moment of creating "The Golden Life".

My absolute favorite detail is the text written on Zora's cane.

As I was prepping the photos to be enlarged, I noticed that there were words here.

And it says, "Live the life you want."

It was an element that was unplanned, but really captured the spirit of the mural.

(bright music) That is a real activation of a corner that has been neglected and was unsafe for many years, and now is such a place of beauty for the people that work and live in the neighborhood.

- [Armisey] Working in this way really brings everything together in terms of "The Golden Life" and how Rachel and I see the women and children in this Newark as people who need to be seen and elevated.

Commuters walking past, they have to look.

- [Rachel] There's a lot of selfies floating around, too.

- [Armisey] There's a lot, yeah!

- [Rachel] Which is really nice.

And especially when it's like, "I know that person!"

and they take a selfie with it.

Like, that's really nice.

- [Armisey] People that I don't know, the first time I meet them, they're talking about the impact that that mural has had.

And even if you're not an artist or, like, artistically inclined, you're still able to, like, connect with that.

Public art tells an amalgam of stories that are not only important, but necessary.

- [Rachel] It's a way for the artists to connect with people on an everyday basis.

Making art in public is a sign of a healthy, creative community.

- [Armisey] Any interaction, minuscule to huge, is important.

- I'm just so proud to be a part of it, and it is a beautiful legacy to leave.

- We are visual people, but we're also communicators.

And how we communicate the importance of Black and Brown women and girls is important.

It's critical and crucial.

(bright music) We cannot forsake the community, our community.

Cannot do it.

And it's an important marker that I can show my nieces, "Your auntie did this."

And like my mother, if she was still here, she'd be like, "My daughter did that."

- [Rachel] Yeah.

(Armisey sighing) - I wish she was there.

I wish she was there to see it.

The mural is about the women, but it's also about the mothers that can't be here and that are rooting for their daughters to make some impact somewhere.

I hope we can work together and make these places where people feel honored and recognized.

(bright music continues) - As we just saw, Newark's tapestry of people and culture creates public art that sparks conversation across generations.

For more on this mural and the importance of art in Newark, we have with us Rebecca Pauline Jampol, co-director of Project for Empty Space, a nonprofit arts organization in Newark, and fayemi shakur, director of the Division of Arts and Cultural Affairs for Newark.

Welcome to both of you, great to have you.

Great to be in your space, truly.

Rebecca, can you tell us about Project for Empty Space?

What is it?

Just, let's start there.

- Sure, we are now a 16-year-old arts nonprofit, and our work really centers around artists that have a social practice.

So, they work with publics and communities to develop art that's meaningful to the spaces that they're in.

And we do so through a couple different pillars, exhibitions, residencies, an affordable workspace, and public art.

- Can you tell us about "The Golden Life" mural and how that came to be?

- Sure.

I think it goes back kind of far, because these projects, this project in particular, is a Bloomberg Asphalt grant awardee.

And to do that, you have to actually partner with a municipality.

And so, I wanna actually hand it off to my partner in crime over here to talk a little bit about how we started this project.

And I think I could touch on how we arrived at the development of it.

- Yeah, go ahead, fayemi, tell us.

- The city has been receiving pro bono consulting from Bloomberg Associates for a few years, now.

And so, they often share opportunities with us.

And there was a grant called Asphalt Art Grant.

And it really is about using art to create safety for pedestrians and traveling areas.

So, we wanted to apply, but it's a national grant.

So, we were fortunate enough to be one of the cities that were selected.

And the location was really important because it's at the intersection of a major transportation area.

- Well, take us back for a minute.

How does art create safety, especially for pedestrians?

- I was just getting to that.

It creates safety because in some studies, it shows how it can slow down traffic.

People are less inclined to speed, and it also makes the area safer to walk.

People feel safer when there's public art around.

It just enhances the area.

- How much of that is perception?

- There's been some studies surveying traffic and safety around these areas.

And that's one of the reasons why Bloomberg created the grant.

- So, talk about the selection process.

Who was chosen and how were they chosen?

- Yeah, so we, Project for Empty Space, in collaboration with the City of Newark, we developed a request for proposals.

And we put it out with a emphasis on the location and thinking about the history of that location and who lives nearby it and who travels through it every day.

It is a really unique location in the sense that it brings together pedestrians, you know, folks driving cars going on and off the interstate, the 280 interstate, and then those that are actually traveling by train.

And so, we had to think about how we could serve all of these audiences and those that are impacted by it every day.

And so, we placed out a request for proposals.

Simultaneously, we also actually put out a survey that asked people to respond to how they felt when they walked through that space.

It was not in good shape.

It was under-lit.

There was quite a bit of vandalism and the walls hadn't been washed down in quite some time.

And so, we collected, you know, sentiment from the community on what it's like to travel through that space.

And that also kind of informed the data and some of the materials that we gave the selected artists.

So, we got in quite a few submissions and pulled together a jury of local arts practitioners and folks from the city and residents that lived nearby.

And we selected a artist duo, Armisey Smith and Rachel Fawn Alban.

Armisey is a painter and mixed media artist, and Rachel Fawn Alban is a photographer.

Both of them have been living and working in the Newark community for some time.

And they proposed this beautiful concept that they would illuminate women and girls from the nearby community, whether they worked nearby, lived nearby, or traveled through that space every day.

And to scale them up to be larger than life, to be the monuments of our community.

- fayemi, in your mind, and as someone who works with the city to beautify spaces and to bring public art forward, why do you believe that representation of women from the city, of all walks of life, all ages, all races, all backgrounds, why is that important?

- I think people really appreciate seeing representations of themselves in public art.

It connects them to their city.

It creates a dialogue.

It also becomes a landmark and creates shared experiences.

And to celebrate women is important.

The women of our city play an important role in so many areas.

And it's just a joy to elevate women and girls in that way.

- Do you see Newark as a vibrant arts community?

- Oh, absolutely.

We were actually, according to SMU DataArts, the seventh most vibrant arts city in the country.

But public art is, like, my favorite thing to do.

- [Joanna] Why?

- [fayemi] I love the idea of providing access to art.

Art shouldn't be considered a luxury.

I love the idea that if someone's having a rough day, maybe one day they walk by a mural and find inspiration or joy or beauty.

- Do you see Newark as still misunderstood or misrepresented culturally in New Jersey and outside of New Jersey?

- I think it's improving.

I think Newark is definitely seen as a city of the arts in a real way.

People come here for arts, culture, and entertainment.

- Talk about your collaboration together and how it's important to have the city's support, and also people who are on the ground, like Rebecca is, encouraging more art, encouraging artists to come forward.

- I love that it gives us the opportunity to support artists and local economies.

We generate so much in terms of economic impact in the city through the arts, but it also helps shape our identity, tell our history, and celebrate our local heroes.

- What do you have to add there, Rebecca?

- fayemi and I have had the great honor of working together on dozens and dozens of projects over the last decade.

And I think the reason why we go so hard for public art is because we have seen how that is reshaping the narrative of the city and the pride, the local pride in the arts, here.

There is a street just a few blocks away from here, Treat Place, where, in 2018, it was a back alleyway to one of our main corridors and nobody would even walk down that street.

It was a grounds for illegal dumping, for vandalism, for crime.

And together with a cohort of partners, that space became a destination for the arts, a place for community pride.

People travel to see that street.

They take photos, they film music videos, family portraits, promote their businesses, throw block parties.

We've seen real results in how public art can advance and better a space for everybody.

- We're sitting among some beautiful art right here.

Can you tell us what the plan is for this?

This isn't just artwork on a wall, right?

This is a mock-up.

What can we expect?

- So, this is a mural that was commissioned by fayemi's department, the Division of Arts and Cultural Affairs at the City of Newark.

And it is a mural that is created in collaboration with a local developer who has a beautiful retainer wall facing McCarter Highway.

Similar to "The Golden Life", we created an RFP that we put out to the public.

And an artist, Eirini Linardaki, she submitted this beautiful proposal to create the Newark skyline with cultural fabrics very present in the Newark community, here.

So, what you see here is a collage of all of us through the lens of fabric.

And she has been hand-painting it in this space, the same space where "The Golden Life" was created.

It'll be mounted and will be a new public artwork that is added to Newark.

- fayemi, tell me about when you first started working for the city.

- I started working for the city in 2020, right before the pandemic, January 2020.

(Rebecca laughing) I had just a couple of months of excitement, and then a crisis.

But we responded really promptly and immediately with the creation of a municipal arts grant to help support the arts sector.

- I imagine that was probably a critical time for artists, right, who otherwise wouldn't have had work.

- Exactly.

- For the city to step in and support them.

- Indeed, yes.

- How do you think that changed the lives of those artists?

- It was a significant impact.

We saw an immediate response and testimonials from artists.

They were able to pay rent, pay bills.

It was a flexible grant.

We didn't have any requirements on how they could spend the funds, as many of them were out of work.

- The city funded that grant?

- Yes.

- Do you have artists who you know benefited from that?

- Yeah, almost every single artist in this building.

So, above us, there's 65 artists' studios.

And each one of them, because they're either a resident or they have a studio here in Newark, qualify to apply to the Creative Catalyst.

And so, all of them at some point have benefited from this grant, which is still active.

So, started during that time, but continued, which is an amazing thing, because a lot of support at that time dwindled at some point.

And for fayemi and the administration to say we need to continue to support this core community was really amazing.

But one other thing I wanna mention is Project for Empty Space has annually been an awardee of the Creative Catalyst.

But as a organizer and a member of the arts community, I think the thing that I really felt during that moment is that we were not alone.

- I can't help but think about the artists, right?

Those who might be struggling to get their artwork out, or I can't imagine it's easy to make a living even as a public artist.

How do you support them?

How do you encourage their growth, their expansion of their careers?

- I'll let Rebecca take that.

- Sure.

- Here at Project for Empty Space, our work is about the artists.

Artists are perhaps, you know, unrecognized.

People see a piece of art, they love it.

But there's somebody behind that work, somebody that is a true stakeholder in the city and who is contributing to the space that we wanna live in.

Artists are some of the greatest economic factors of this city.

In addition to them bringing beauty into our spaces and encouraging visitation and to stay, and to eat in our local restaurants or to stay in our hotels.

They also are, you know, homeowners, and rent studio space in Downtown Newark.

And it's our job here at Project for Empty Space, in collaboration with our partners to recognize that, to talk about the artists before we talk about the art, and to ensure that they're resourced.

- Another project that was quite significant is the Harriet Tubman monument.

It really gave us ways to reimagine public art, but also tell Harriet Tubman's story as it also relates to Newark and the Underground Railroad network and slavery in the state of New Jersey.

It was very educational for our community and a celebratory moment when we were able to open that up to the public.

- In one word, what does art mean to you?

- Joy.

- Oh, that one is so good!

Belonging.

- All really, really important discussions to be having here in the City of Newark and beyond.

Rebecca Pauline Jampol, fayemi shakur, I can't thank you both enough.

Doing great work, here, thank you.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- That's gonna do it for us.

You can check out the full "Painting Community" documentary series at pbs.org.

I'm Joanna Gagis.

(upbeat music) For everyone here at "NJ Spotlight News", thanks for being with us.

We'll see you next time.

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