p.s. 36 margaret douglas school in manhattan
At Margaret Douglas School (P.S. 036) in Manhattan, I worked with fifth graders to develop ideas for and execute a mural as a gift from the 2022 graduating class to the school. The students in the class had been through traumatic events, including Covid-19 disasters, deaths of friends and family members, the upending of school and life routines, and the ever-present awareness of the temporary nature of any human decisions about life. They were acutely aware of the need for community and solidarity; they were sometimes belligerent, sometimes sad, sometimes absurdist, sometimes hilariously comic. Their recent life experiences had given them both an intense and sometimes terrifying vision of the world, as well as an instinct to protect themselves and their friends.
The visions thrown out in brainstorming sessions included:
a schoolbus flying to the stars, skateboarding kids following it, the buildings of NYC being torn up from their foundations, a bus stop outside the school, an ice cream truck, the inclusion of death and upheaval, a desire for commemoration–kids looking toward the GWB Bridge remembering friends and relatives who had suffered or died during Covid-19, and aliens (sometimes imagined as human-eating, sometimes as protective forces) from another planet coming down to earth to try to help us save it. We sketched all this onto big paper, in several versions, trying to create a unified and exciting plan.
Our process included creation of a textured color background, through almost pointillist techniques, imitated with sponges and dots of color that the kids added all over the wall at an early stage.
As we sketched and painted our epic journey onto the wall outside the school, over the course of about 14 after school art sessions, school community members came by to admire and support us: the mural design was helped along by many welcome additions of favorite birds, flowers and other images offered by school staff.
Ultimately, we worked together to build a complex, beautiful, scary but in the end encouraging and heartening scene that told a story of upheaval and uprooting, memory, aspirations, the possibility of learning and growing, and the importance of seeking help for survival from our friends and even our extraterrestrial contacts (!)–and the value of preserving our earth and environment for ourselves and those who come after us. The mural was a gift from the fifth grade of 2022 to the school as they graduated. It continues in its whimsical way to inspire students, staff and others in the school community and the broader city around the school.
