MULTIMEDIA

Public Art gallery

If one were to paint the recent history of Indianapolis' Near-Eastside, the images would include boarded-up buildings, dilapidated landmarks like the old Rivoli Theater and, more recently, the shooting of a 29-year-old policeman.

It wouldn't be a pretty picture. Yet pictures are exactly what Indianapolis community groups are turning to in an attempt to revitalize blighted, "transitional" neighborhoods like the East 10th Street corridor.

In the past three years, seven murals have been put up throughout a gateway area comprising such neighborhoods as Emerson Heights, Woodruff Place, Windsor Park and Springdale as part of an overall "Quality of Life" plan by the East 10th Street Civic Association, said executive director Tammi Hughes.

The group has transformed the once busy and ugly corner of Rural and 10th into beautiful Moon Block Park, with perennial gardens and pavement, and two murals by Brian Duff depicting local street scenes both historic and current.

A wooden fence not far from the park was used as the canvas for a bucolic scene by artist Randy Piotrowski. And the boards covering a set of windows on an abandoned building were used by Bryan Myers to paint a blue sky, with toy planes fluttering through space.

"You're kind of defining a place," said Hughes, about the works created throughout the neighborhood. "So you're kind of defining your community."

There are also plans for students from Brookside Elementary School 54 to help create a tile mosaic for a retaining wall on the school's campus, and other plans for community-created murals on private residences.

"We wanted to start creating positive spaces along the district, places that folks could identify with, to build community pride and share the history of the district," said Hughes, sitting in front of a large mural by Morris Kurz, depicting a soccer match at Arsenal Technical High School, with Downtown Indianapolis in the distance.

"It's not anything new. It's nothing that hasn't been applied to other blighted commercial areas in the United States. But it is something new to the 10th Street corridor."

Bob White, who owns Jackson Control Co. -- the temperature engineering business upon which Kurz's mural is painted -- said he believes that public art serves to draw people out and involve them.

"The mural is fantastic," White said. "It's got a lot of comments from a lot of people, and I think it inspires people, showing them what can be done with an empty space. And once some people start cleaning up, other people start taking similar pride."

Mindy Taylor Ross, director of public art at the Arts Council of Indianapolis, said one of the main goals of public art is the creation of shared experiences.

"Public art in general provides an opportunity for communities to come together," Ross said. "It's really about creating a collective expression, and I think that can be very unifying."

Scott VanKirk, president of the Watson-McCord Neighborhood Association, is trying to unify about 16,000 Indy residents.

The Watson-McCord association recently completed three years of work on McCord Park (on 36th Street), which involved refurbishing a sundial that had fallen into disrepair, using a $10,000 Keep Indianapolis Beautiful grant. The group worked with third- and fourth-graders on projects as simple as painting trash cans for the area.

"So we've now impacted 40-some kids, that now will hopefully want to stay invested in the neighborhood, who will be able to go back when they're older and say, 'Look what I did,'." said VanKirk. "Because a lot of trouble with litter is from the kids themselves, so to have them be part of making the sundial and the trash cans, it gives them a certain degree of pride."

Greg Charleston, president of the Arts Council of Indianapolis, said the value of public art is measured in a number of ways, many of which are not quantifiable.

A 2005 study by social scientists at the RAND Corp. noted that during the "culture wars" of the 1990s, arts advocates came under increasing pressure to articulate the value of public art. The study found that instrumental benefits and direct outcomes are hard to measure, but the vast majority of the benefits of public art are subjective personal responses, and the creation of lasting social bonds.

"We get a lot of feedback from people saying, 'Yes, this has value,' 'Yes, I want to see this in my city,' 'Yes, I want to give money to this,'." Charleston said.

"I think the practical purpose can be to beautify, to make things look better, but beyond that I think there's a lot of studies that show that when a community works on a piece, or when an artist works with kids in the neighborhood on a mural, there's no more graffiti on that wall.

"There's a certain respect that comes from the fact that people there have done that. There's a sense of ownership and stewardship, and you see that all the time."

There also is a strong tradition in Indianapolis of using public art as a means of memorializing someone, said Ross, including perhaps the most famous local example, "Landmark for Peace," a statue of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy reaching toward each other.

Located on the Near-Northside at Broadway and 17th Street, the statue is made from melted guns from a local buy-back program.

"I think public art can be cathartic, especially in communities that may be more in transition, where people are feeling more hardships," said Ross. "Because of crime being on the rise, we can also talk about public art as a means of positive expression."

Matt Eickhoff, 31, expressed his feelings about a portion of East 10th Street through "At the bus stop, without delay."

He created the $4,000 mural, which depicts a bus stop scene on East 10th Street, after being commissioned by Partners in Housing, an organization that creates safe and affordable housing for low-income or special needs people in Indianapolis.

Eickhoff used to live on 10th Street, just east of Woodruff Place. Although he came from a diverse neighborhood, he didn't want to paint the issue of race into his work, so the faces within the mural are not black or white, but colorful -- from teal to purple to pink to orange.

Eickhoff said the bus stop seemed like the perfect, indirect way of communicating part of the character of the (area).

"If you've never ridden the bus, it's quite an experience," Eickhoff said. "It's interesting ... and it's environmentally sound, and you really get to know the place."

When a man approached Eickhoff in front of the mural last week, asking for some cash -- armed with a story about a broken down car and needing $9 to get a taxi to Greenwood because he hasn't been able to get anything off anyone "here in the 'hood" -- Eickhoff told him to take the bus.

"I used to ride the bus," he said, smiling. "That's how I know it goes to Greenwood."

Sheila Adsit also approached Eickhoff that day. A former Woodruff Place resident who now lives in Brookside, Adsit rehabs homes in the area.

"I just love this mural," said the 68-year-old Adsit, shaking Eickhoff's hand vigorously. "It just spoke to me about revitalization and the beauty of the neighborhood."

Adsit, who was on her way into her community credit union, said she and the whole neighborhood have been encouraged by the recent renewal efforts.

"The atmosphere of the area is just getting really colorful," she said. "Art is the language of the soul."

Funding for public art

The bulk of fundraising for public art projects is actually done at the grassroots level -- from local merchants donating materials to citizens donating their time and money, said Mindy Taylor Ross, director of public art at the Arts Council of Indianapolis.

Grant money also is available, as well as help finding funds, from groups like the Arts Council of Indianapolis, the Local Initiative Support Corporation, Art for a Heart, Rotary, Keep Indianapolis Beautiful and the Central Indiana Community Foundation (which has an Inspired Places Initiative).

Going public with art projects

Public art projects designed to beautify neighborhoods can be found throughout Indianapolis. Here's information about several existing and upcoming works:

An excellent idea

Jeff Martin was one of two finalists in the Great Ideas Competition run by the Arts Council of Indianapolis, which allowed him to construct "Urban Silos" -- two large silo-shaped steel sculptures, covered in bronze, with a lounge at the base of each one. The piece is intended to transport people back to childhood, to a time when it was easier to take a moment, lie on the ground, and question why the sky is blue.

Location: On the Monon Trail at 38th Street (near the Indiana State Fairgrounds).

A helping hand

Three weeks ago, Windsor Park resident Joyce Henry approached the East 10th Street Civic Association. Henry, who is undergoing treatment for cancer, had seen murals throughout the area and wanted to know if something could be done with her home's gray retaining wall. It could. On Tuesday, from 9:30 a.m. to noon, high school-age Purdue Extension students will work with younger area children on a paint-by-numbers mural to beautify Henry's fence.

Location: 1114 N. Jefferson Ave.

Arts(pocket)park

To see a beautiful example of a carefully conceived pocket park revitalization, visit Moon Block Park on the city's Near Eastside. With the help of the East 10th Street Civic Association, the Local Initiatives Support Corporation, the Village Pantry and other local merchants and citizens, the small park is a picture of perennials, made all the more scenic by the work of Brian Duff, who was commissioned to create two murals depicting the neighborhood in its heyday.

Location: East 10th and Rural streets.

Cover-up

Nothing says "blighted neighborhood" more than the boarded-up windows of a large abandoned building located on a main business strip. So that's exactly what Bryan Myers used as the canvas for a work on East 10th Street. He painted each set of boards a brilliant sky blue and added a series of red-propellered white toy planes flying in all directions.

Location: On the south side of East 10th Street, a few blocks from the old Rivoli Theater.

Pulling together

Scott VanKirk, Kevin Warren, dozens of third- and fourth-graders, as well as many other community figures, put their heart and soul into the rebirth of McCord Park. The group did everything from landscaping and gardening to painting trash cans to revitalizing and augmenting a sundial commemorating William Whitfield, the first black policeman killed in the line of duty in Indianapolis in 1922.

Location: On 36th Street, between College and Central avenues.

Just the beginning

One of the first public art projects initiated in the East 10th Street corridor was a large-scale mural by Morris Kurz. The mural, which depicts soccer players from Arsenal Technical High School towering above the area, with the Downtown skyline in the background, is just Phase 1. Kurz is also being commissioned to complete two more murals, transforming an old cinderblock wall into a neighborhood gateway.

Location: On the north side of East 10th Street, near Woodruff Place.

Six little pieces

With funding partners including Partners in Housing and the Arts Council of Indianapolis, Matt Eickhoff was able to create "At the bus stop, without delay," a $4,000 mural in six parts on the east-facing wall of Community Choice Federal Credit Union on East 10th Street. If they take a moment to look left, drivers heading Downtown through the area will see a mural that re-creates a bus stop scene in front of the John H. Boner Community Center, the locus of much of the neighborhood's activity.

Location: 2811 E. 10th St.