Rethinking Community Building and Mental Health in New York City

The NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) sought to develop a program to promote mental health awareness and stigma reduction using a community driven process.  I was hired to design, launch, and operationalize the NYCMAP program, ensuring it aligned with the Bureau of Mental Health’s goals. To create a program that interests placemaking, community development and mental health, I developed a framework utilizing arts-based practices, community engagement events, and person centered recovery practices to support mental health peers and engage residents and community groups across neighborhoods. I direct and manage all program operations and service delivery, while implementing large scale public art throughout New York City’s five boroughs.

Learn more about each mural.

Context

How can community-mural making engage various people in constructive mental health conversations and support awareness around mental health and community-based topics? 1 in 5 New Yorkers experiences a mental health condition in a given year; it touches us all or our family and friends. Yet mental health and mental illness are, oftentimes, misunderstood or not discussed. These stigmas may hold people back from seeking support and recognizing multiple factors that affect health and wellness. These conversations are rarely discussed in community spaces or harnessed to collectively develop something for a neighborhood.   

Approach

I used concepts of the design process to develop a program that is responsive to different neighborhoods and culturally relevant topics, while raising mental health awareness and executing public art. To execute the NYCMAP program, I cultivate project teams within neighborhoods. We specifically partner with behavioral health service providers to anchor the program in a community, and then onboard muralists and mental health peer specialists to facilitate the program’s activity plans. We host workshops and public events in the Discover Phase to develop the mural theme, support peers’ recovery, and foster additional community partnerships. We continue the workshop series and launch more public events in the Design Phase, using participatory design methods that build on the previous phase to create mural imagery, learn about mental health services, and help reduce mental health stigmas. Once mural designs are approved by community members we begin mural production in the Deploy Phase. Here we print and paint panels of canvas (polytab) at large community painting events and at different community spaces before installing the large works of art in prominent and impactful neighborhood spaces.

Outcome

I successfully developed and launched the NYC Mural Arts Program across the City. The program has supported partnering service providers to help expand their community relationships and has engaged over 900 people throughout the process. I have placed murals ranging from 2,000-4,000 square feet on complex facilities ranging from walls 60 feet above elevated metro lines to the Lincoln Tunnel Bridge. I oversee up to 35 personnel and vendors during a mural season. I directed the development of the prominent brand identity and marketing, and I manage all operational production and planning, and promote cross agency collaboration. In our second year, we obtained additional funding and support from the Laurie Tisch Illumination Fund (LTIF) to develop the NYCMAP manual for a future evaluation study. I guided and edited the manual and developed an evaluation tool to track shifts in program participants’ attitudes about mental illness and awareness of mental health topics.