PS 18: We, the Power

Featuring Art Direction by Vanesa Álvarez Díaz (Brooklyn 2022)
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The mural at P.S.18 is divided into 6 different sections. It dresses the stairs and each of its landings (3 stairs and 3 landings) that go from floor two to floor five. Into the Black Lives Matter umbrella, the topics to work with the students have been three, Empathy, Restorative Justice, and Diversity since this school is formed with kids and teachers from a wide variety of nationalities and ethnicities.

We worked with 101 children, in 6 different groups. Each group has a stair section in the mural. With so many students, spaces, and different ages, in order to create a balanced, motivating, and full-of-energy design, we decided to propose and work on the themes from a “community superheroes” perspective.

We asked each kid to draw themselves as superheroes and think about their community superpowers. Then, we drew the students and several teachers in a “cartoon-style” with a power pose.  After this, we added the phrases with the powers that they shared with us like brave, justice, fly, intelligence, travel to the past to save people, smart, healing, superkind, empathy, peace, I have the power to help, love, girl power, super hugger, read, I make plants grow, BLM, save people from danger, magic, make you learn, heal, super helper, yeah! save the world, etc.

In the background, we used stripes, stars, circles, the Williamsburg Bridge, and the Manhattan highline, because this is the view from some of their classrooms.

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Project Details

We, the Power
PS 18 (2022)


• Art Direction: Vanesa Álvarez Díaz
• Contributing Artists: Aranxta Rodriguez
• 120 Square Feet
• Medium: Acrylic and Latex on Polytab installed over brick
• Sponsored by DCLA, PS 18

  • Elementary School
  • Interior

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