James Salon x GWCF

Global Works Community Fund is a Portland nonprofit that normally sends high schoolers from different backgrounds abroad, where they do community work in a new culture and come back with a different view of the world. The pandemic shut that down, so the organizers went looking for a new way to get their students doing something that mattered. Someone suggested a mural. We got the call to help make it happen.

We spent time with the group first, just listening, gathering what the teenagers actually wanted to say. A local activist artist took those ideas and turned them into four separate murals addressing Black Lives Matter, the abolition of ICE, and justice for migrant workers, subjects these teens had clearly been thinking about long before anyone handed them a paintbrush. James Salon offered up their large space in the Pearl District to host the work and agreed to keep it up for months afterward.

The install itself ran two full days, staff, artists, and a group of BIPOC teenagers all working side by side. Between coats of paint, kids talked about what was happening in the country and what they wanted to see change. Watching teenagers that young speak with that much clarity about justice was humbling, honestly, and it's the kind of project that reminds you why this work matters. This mural workshop became part of the Together We Grow Community Art Project, which brought socially driven public art to spaces across Portland.

Have a group, a cause, or a message that deserves a public platform? Kali Grey can organize the workshop, pair you with the right artist, and manage the full installation from idea to finished wall. Reach out and let's talk about what you're trying to say.