Health Democracy

3 Local Art Icons Join “Next Stop: Democracy!”

Application for More Artists Still Open!

 

Can public art help increase voter turnout in Philadelphia this November? Today we are excited to announce that 3 of our area’s most celebrated artists will help us answer this question!

Award-winning mosaic mural artist, Isaiah Zagar, and internally renowned street artists, Gaia and NoseGo, will all be creating one-of-a-kind “Vote Here” signs for a city-wide Election Day art installation.

Recognized for his decades of work creating more than 200 public installations throughout the city of Philadelphia and around the world, Isaiah Zagar is the true definition of an artistic legend. In addition to his incredible public pieces, Isaiah’s work is included in the permanent collections of numerous art institutions, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, as well as, of course, his own Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens.

Baltimore-based artist, Gaia, who was recently listed in Forbes ‘30 Under 30’ in Art and Style, has been a valued member of the street art community in Philly over the last several years. Most recently creating a dynamic new mural in Fishtown which asks: ‘What is the aesthetic of reinvestment/gentrification?’ As well as his participation in last month’s “Evolution of Street Art” panel discussion at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

NoseGo is a Philadelphia-based artist with a passion for illustration and media arts. His work can be found on walls and in galleries around the world – but most importantly throughout Philadelphia. Over the last number of years, NoseGo has truly cemented himself as the rising star of Philadelphia’s contemporary/street art scene.

Needless to say, we are beyond thrilled to have these 3 incredible artists joining us for this project, and we can not wait to see the signs they create!

Isaiah, Gaia, and NoseGo will join a total of about 50 Philadelphia-area artists in creating signs for Next Stop: Democracy!

If you’re an artist interested in working on the project, submissions are open for only a few more days – closing Friday, June 19th. So be sure to click HERE to apply today!

7 More Incredible Philly Artists Join Next Stop: Democracy!

This week we are SO THRILLED to announce 7 more incredible Philly-based artists have joined Next Stop: Democracy to help us create a New Look for Election Day!

These 7 artists will be creating 6 “Vote Here” signs which will be revealed on Election Day, November 3rd at polling locations across the city. So, without further ado, meet our newest artists:

Harlequinade

Kelly Kozma 

Ryan Beck

Sean Martorana

Miriam Singer

And the Braille Street Art team of Sonia Petruse and Austin Seraphin

Sonia and Austin’s sign, in particular, will explore accessibility with regards to polling stations and signage around polling locations. Their sign will contain elements which are visual, as well as elements that are accessible to people with visual impairments… MUCH more on this to come, so stay tuned!

And be sure to check out our pervious artists announcements here, here, here, and here! (Yes, we’ve got a TON of amazing artists ready to help show Election Day some love.)

A Quick Shout Out to Next Stop: Democracy’s Incredible Advisory Committee!

Photos from our first Advisory Committee meeting at Pipeline last month…

Have we mentioned our amazing Advisory Committee yet?

To help us best execute our ambitious (to say the least) project, we have established a little army of Philly’s best, brightest, and most civically engaged individuals to advise us along the way!

Today, we’d like to take a quick moment to thank this growing list of incredible people for their time and insights, including: Mo Manklang, Sara McCorriston, Donnell Powell, Patrick Shillenn, Rudy Flesher, Erica Atwood, Sara Ann Kelly PR, Christina Wong, Glen Knapp, Rachel Zimmerman, Dietrich Meyer, Paul Farber, David Guinn, Emma Fried-Cassorla, Neil Bardhan, Skai Blue Media, and My MilkCrate.

We’re so lucky to live in a city with so many fabulously motivated people!

Announcing the 21 Winning Open Application Artists!

SO excited to announce the 21 winning artists from our open applications: Lawren Alice, Joshua Black, Aubree Eisenwinter, Christopher Fernandez, Mike Jackson, Charles Keenan, Emily Kesselman, Amber Lynn, Sarah Lownes, Jessie Mademann, Lily Meier, Dennis Murphy, Ryan Psota, Jaison Smulski, Nicole Sonsini, Alexa Stefanou, Kelsey Stoler, Anthony Torcasio, Lindsey Tweed, Mac Whalen, and Patrick Vinh!

THANK YOU to everyone that applied… We had no idea what to expect when opening our application process, but we were so delightfully surprised to find so many amazing artists wanting to be apart of this project!

Check out the winners’s bios HERE!

 

 

Announcing the “Next Stop: Democracy!” Kickstarter

And before I can even hit ‘publish’ on this post, we’re 20% funded!

We’ve got the right team, we’ve got the initial Knight Foundation support, and we’re getting more and more amazing artists each day (including folks like NoseGo, Ishknits, Gaia, and Isaiah Zagar), but there’s still one thing we need your help with…

To truly do this right and to honor our artists and Philly voters alike, we want to offer our artists locally made, reliable, and durable signs to work on. Signs that are more than signs. Signs that are canvases.

That’s where Darla comes in!

Darla runs the Philadelphia Sculpture Gym, and she’s ready to build us sign frames that will be functional and beautiful! The alternative? Cheap, plastic signs that we order off the Internet.

These high-quality wooden signs are more expensive than the mass-produced plastic ones, of course. And that’s where you come in! With your donation, we’re one BIG step closer to creating a new look for Election Day in Philadelphia.

Click HERE to watch our Kickstarter video, and to donate today… THANK YOU!

 

 

 

Geekadelphia: Braille Street Artists Bring Accessibility Talks to Philadelphia Mayoral Election

“Seraphin and Petruse see Next Stop: Democracy! as a means of generating awareness around a city infrastructure sorely in need of modernized accessibility… As of 2015, of the 1687 designated polling places scattered throughout Philadelphia, only 44 have been deemed fully accessible by the Philadelphia Office of City Commissioners.”

So glad two of our artists are helping to bring this very real issue to light by way of our project… Read more at Geekadelphia HERE!