Street Talk: Public Art in East Harlem

After the incident, Hope Community decided to look at the walls, their messages, messengers, and how those messages are perceived. “Street Talk: Public Art in East Harlem” details the historical and cultural significance of community art, and demonstrates how public art plays a big role in defining the identity of El Barrio and its residents.

The landmark painting has significant historical roots in Spanish Harlem and has served as a cultural attraction for thousands of students and tourists from around the country and the world.

Commissioned by Hope Community, Inc. in 1978, the four-story mural was created by Hank Prussing and featured local residents engaging in everyday activities. Artist Manny Vega, who’d served as Prussing's apprentice, restored the badly weathered painting in the mid-1990s.

Photo by Rodney Zagury

Support for the Arts

Hope Community has long supported the arts in East Harlem and the agency has worked to build a sense of community among local residents by producing annual street fairs and arts programming.

Seed of Growth

Seed of Growth is an outdoor fountain sculpture designed by Lina Puerta, currently underway in the Modesto Flores Garden on Lexington Avenue near 104 street. The public art project was inspired by the strength and diversity of women in the East Harlem community. Once completed, the concrete and mosaic sculpture will also function as a working water fountain, continually feeding the small stream in the middle of Hope's Modesto Flores Community Garden. Hope expects to unveil the sculpture by Spring 2008. Click here for more information.

Outdoor Youth Murals

In 2006, the agency joined forces with several arts-related agencies to implement summer youth employment programs with a creative twist. Over two-dozen local youth were involved in separate employment programs run by Groundswell Community Mural Project and Creative Arts Workshop for Kids.

Working under the tutelage of lead artists Eduardo Rabel and Alex Pimienta, one group of teens completed Groundswell's collaborative teaching program which included the design and creation of a mural alongside a building adjacent to Hope's Lexington Avenue community garden, located between 123rd and 124th Street.

The idea for the Groundswell “Making His-Story” mural came about through several public forums during which the youth interviewed local residents and discussed different ideas for the project.

Hope senior staff joined artist Rabel and local youth and neighbors last summer for a priming "paint party" for the "Making His-Story" youth mural. The mural painting then continued throughout July. Afterward, volunteers from Washington Mutual Bank joined the youth in cleaning, seeding, and planting other areas of the vest-pocket park.

The Lexington Avenue mural was unveiled on November 4th, 2006, during a small ceremony held in the community garden.

In August 2006, another group of youth teamed up with organizers from Creative Arts Workshop 4 Kids to work in Hope's community garden on East 115th Street on the design and implementation of a colorful sports mural in Hope's community garden on East 115th Street (between First and Pleasant Avenues). Volunteers from American Express also braved the summer heat to help the youth design and paint the mural. The 115th Street community garden mural was then unveiled during a ceremony held on August 15th.

Julia de Burgos Mosaic

On Friday, October 27, 2006, Iris Consuelo Burgos unveiled an historic mosaic by artist Manny Vega honoring her sister, Julia de Burgos, the revered Boricua poet. The ceremony took place in the heart of East Harlem’s “Cultural Corridor” on the northeast corner of Lexington Avenue and East 106th Street. Click here for more information.

Portobello Remembered

Hope board chairman Roger Cabán's other talents were also on display last October at the opening of "Portobello Remembered," a collection of black and white photographs taken by the award-winning former photographer in Panama in the mid-1970s. The exhibit is on display at the agency's Ortiz-Wittenberg Gallery, 171 East 109th Street.