It’s Our Turn

2021 It’s Our turn

Site: Stoveworks, 1250 E. 13th St.

Artists: Veteran Magic Markers Kennedy Bass, Skylar Muhammad, Ricardo Nache, and Tahlia Smith

Partners: Stoveworks

Description: Four former Magic Marker youth participated in workshops led by Mark Making to design and create a mural from start to finish based on themes that affect them personally: the challenges of getting a good education, namely the bullying, drug abuse and gang activity happening every day in their schools.

Kennedy Bass, Skylar Muhammad, Ricardo Nache and Tahlia Smith identified a theme suitable for the challenging site offered by Charlotte Caldwell at Stove Works, and collaborated with creatives Josiah Golson and Genesis the Greykid to develop drawings and words appropriate for their concept.

The mural features a school hallway where bullying, drug abuse and gang activity are taking place, a group portraits of the youth who are apart and have made decisions to avoid these behaviors. They hope to inspire other teens and say “It’s Our Turn” to have civic focus on the hard core issues that determine the future of us all.  On the bottom panels are listed those who have died from bullycide, drug overdose or as a result of gang activity. It’s time for these unnecessary  deaths to stop.

The youth were hired by Mark Making to create this project from scratch and once a visual concept and mock up were ready, they learned about funding to support the mural execution. To this end, they wrote and were awarded an ArtsBuild grant, made numerous public presentations and created a video for an awesome and successful GoFundMe campaign that secured the rest of the funding.

Facilitators included Josiah Golson, Genisis the Greykid, Shea Brill and Frances McDonald with pecial help from Hannah Owens and Randy Fairchild.

It’s Our Turn was funded in part by Stoveworks, Mark Making, individual donors and a kickstart campaign on GoFundMe (https://youtu.be/4cNwmRcjijo).

"It is an honor and quite humbling to be the location of 'It's Our Turn.' It is a testament to the fortitude and ambition of youth. By becoming the agents of their truths and of others, Skylar, Kennedy, Tahlia, and Ricardo have created a mural that resonates and wells within each of us." 

Charlotte Caldwell, Director of Stove Works