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KCAI students transform Historic Northeast with visions of ballerinas and urban farms

Kansas City Art Institute junior Bea Morff paints a bright pink glow around a star on a mural in Kansas City’s Historic Northeast. An illustration class is bringing a little beauty to a neglected space between homes to help connect neighbors.
Julie Denesha
/
KCUR 89.3
Kansas City Art Institute junior Bea Morff paints a bright pink glow around a star on a mural in Kansas City’s Historic Northeast. An illustration class is bringing a little beauty to a neglected space between homes to help connect neighbors.

Illustration students from the Kansas City Art Institute are inviting artists of all ages to help them complete colorful murals that are turning a neglected alleyway into a communal space for neighbors to gather.

Juniors from the Kansas City Art Institute have spent the past several months designing and painting murals in the alleys between homes in the Historic Northeast neighborhood.

It’s part of a semester-long class called Us: Collaboration, taught by associate professor of illustration Héctor Casanova.

This is the second year Casanova’s students have created murals in these often neglected spaces. The aim, he said, is to beautify the neighborhood and make the alleys feel safer.

“By bringing artwork that stimulates pedestrian traffic, people walk more and check them out,” Casanova said.

The students have been working with Linda Fleischman, former vice president for the Pendleton Heights Kansas City Neighborhood Association. She said the alley project started as a way to spark community engagement.

“The alleys in any neighborhood can be challenging, but we're turning them into communal spaces now,” she said.

“People are seeing the good it does,” Fleischman said. “It's just really meaningful work that's changing the face of our neighborhood for the better.”

Tomatoes, pepper plants and an urban farmer come to life in greens, reds and gold. The illustration class, led by associate professor of illustration Héctor Casanova, is designed to teach students to collaborate to accomplish big projects.
Julie Denesha
/
KCUR 89.3
Tomatoes, pepper plants and an urban farmer come to life in greens, reds and gold. The illustration class, led by associate professor of illustration Héctor Casanova, is designed to teach students to collaborate to accomplish big projects.

Students also work with neighborhood residents to develop the imagery and themes of their murals, before designing and executing the project.

“Part of the fun is receiving input from the community, because everybody has to live with this artwork and we want to make sure that they feel like they have some representation, some voice — they had some input in it,” Casanova said.

“But the other thing that's happened,” he said, “is that neighbors are now meeting. So it helps to bring cohesiveness into the community, just making a tighter knit community in general.”

The muralists make their final push to the finish line on Oct. 12, hosting a public outreach event to complete the project.

“We are welcoming any neighbors, friends, anybody who wants to come help us finish the project,” Casanova said. “We need to do two coats of varnish on both murals and we're looking at 850 square feet total. So they're big.”

Artful chickens and ballerinas

On Wednesday afternoon, illustration junior Eku Uresti was painting with a team of five students on a bright yellow ballerina surrounded by abstract peony blossoms. The project took shape on a wooden fence on one side of the alley.

Uresti said the mural serves two purposes for the neighborhood.

“Not only is it very beautiful, but it is a little selfie spot for anyone to just stand in the middle and have these very beautiful wings,” Uresti said.

Carly Burkholder, left, Casanova, and Serena Wilson take a moment to reassess a color on a mural. The students got input from neighborhood residents during the design process.
Julie Denesha
/
KCUR 89.3
Carly Burkholder, left, Casanova, and Serena Wilson take a moment to reassess a color on a mural. The students got input from neighborhood residents during the design process.

On the other side of the alley, seven students decorated a wall with painted pepper plants, tomatoes and chickens.

“I'm really excited to see the chickens,” student Carly Burkholder said. “Those are like my favorite part. I think they're really cute.”

Burkholder hoped the work would be beautiful and that it would help solve a recurring neighborhood problem.

“We were asked by the property owners to do a mural because they were getting tagged, and they have to pay fines for it by the city even though they're not the ones that do it,” she explained.

Wilson, left, and Burkholder reload their palettes with paint during an afternoon painting session.
Julie Denesha
/
KCUR 89.3
Wilson, left, and Burkholder reload their palettes with paint during an afternoon painting session.

Burkholder said this is also a chance for members of the class to work together on an ambitious project.

“We're all focusing on how to be a group,” she said. “It's definitely really hard for artists to go from doing their individual style to having to collaborate with other students, whose style may be, like, the complete opposite.”

Historic neighborhoods transformed

Before the alleys project, the Kansas City Public School District enlisted Casanova’s classes to create murals for decommissioned schools like Scarritt Elementary and the John J. Pershing School in the Blue Hills neighborhood.

Casanova said taggers tend to prefer blank walls.

“Those two schools were being tagged on a weekly basis,” he said. “And now months and months will go by and occasionally tags happen.”

Keira Eide paints an abstract peony on a fence in the alley.
Julie Denesha
/
KCUR 89.3
Keira Eide paints an abstract peony on a fence in the alley.

Casanova stepped off the ladder where he’d been adding a coat of green paint to the top of a mural. The project requires a lot of time and preparation, much of it outside of the classroom.

“I was asking myself this morning, like, ‘Why do I do these things? Like, why am I doing this?’” Casanova said. “It's for the endorphin rush of just being able to see that this is making people's lives so much brighter.”

KCAI muralists host a community paint day Saturday, Oct. 12, from 1 to 5 p.m. at 2412 Pendleton Ave., Kansas City, Missouri 64124. All ages and skill levels are welcome.

Julie Denesha is the arts reporter for KCUR. Contact her at julie@kcur.org.
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