April 9, 2004 – October 3, 2004

Founded in 1994, the Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia, is a nonprofit organization that provides a political and cultural voice for Asian Americans. It is an arts center where the community can explore and express their diverse experiences through a variety of art forms that include the visual and performing arts, media arts, and poetry. At its core, the Initiative believes “that we must first imagine change in order to create change, and that community arts are a crucial resource and repository for our collective imagining.”

Selected Work from the Youth Arts Mural Workshop

In partnership with the Mural Arts Program, Philadelphia, Asian American teens learn about the mural making process—concept, design, materials, and techniques. The young artists also learn how to translate the design into a large-scale painting as each workshop culminates with the realized mural. This exhibition features selected work created in preparation for the mural and includes portraits, masks, and collaborative projects from participants in the Youth Arts Mural Workshop, 2003-04.