Above: Community History Timeline (click to forward)
In 2017 ArtsWave and Design Impact led a creative placemaking workshop to improve quality of life in Cincinnati communities by infusing arts and creativity into everyday life. I worked on a team with some Madisonville Community Urban Redevelopment Corporation and other community volunteers — we interviewed residents and identified opportunities such as Bramble Park as a venue for events, celebrations and recreation.
In a 2019 event Keep Cincinnati Beautiful, Cincinnati Parks and volunteers from Gorilla Glue implemented some of these concepts developed from the ArtsWave/Design Impact Creative Placemaking community interviews.
Since then, I have felt disheartened. I was hoping that our work would create more opportunities for jobs and black-owned businesses in our neighborhood but I feel that the current racist structure of capitalism has once again created another opportunity for gentrification. Rents have tripled and one black-owned business had to relocate at great economic cost to their business and cost the livelihoods of their employees.
The mural design was created in the winter of 2016. The history of Madisonville reflects the history of the United States and many of our mistakes as a nation, mainly the massacre and systematic oppression of Native Americans and African Americans.
For me, I am trying to learn from this experience on best practices moving forward: how to provide art experiences for people of all backgrounds, create opportunities for all fellow creatives. I plan to develop a page detailing my goals and progress. Going forward, I would also collaborate or take a smaller role and ensure artists from other ethnicities and races would have the opportunity to lead the commission and the ability to tell their own stories.