HOUSTON \u2014 At the I-45 underpass at Milam and Pierce Streets in Midtown, a vibrant art installation is sending a powerful message of hope and humanity. Artist Sherman Finch, who collaborated with a group of unhoused individuals in Houston, said, “Try and talk about hope, try and talk about humanity.” <\/p>\n
For months, Finch engaged with the community, listening to their experiences, and together they painted the installation. “Their personal stories are literally right on these pillars. This is a makeup of literally 12 different stories, and each pillar builds off of the other pillar, and it almost starts as a narrative,” Finch said.<\/p>\n
The project, part of “Huemans:Shelter,” aims to challenge misconceptions about homelessness. Funded by a $1 million grant from the Bloomberg Philanthropies Public Art Challenge, it includes six art installations around Midtown, all created by different artists and teams of unhoused individuals. The installations feature a colorful creation at the underpass near Spur 527 and Alabama, three METRO bus shelters, and a large-scale mural to be placed at Career and Recovery Resources.<\/p>\n
Artist Chris Rocha said, “I’ve never seen such community, such close-knit bonds between people until working on this project.” Rocha added, “The unhoused individuals who shared their stories here got paid for helping with the artwork, but this project is so much more than that.”<\/p>\n
Cynthia Alvarado, Director of Operations and Strategic Planning for the Midtown Management District, which is leading the project, emphasized the broader goals. “It’s not just about moving people off the street, but trying to really think of better ways to give people opportunities,” Alvarado said. She added, “To learn job skills in ways that can get them re-entered back into society.”<\/p>\n
All six installations are expected to be completed by next month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2014 At the I-45 underpass at Milam and Pierce Streets in Midtown, a vibrant art installation is…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":188841,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5133],"tags":[5229,105696,105700,105697,7265,105699,17833,7202,7203,105698,358,3187,105701,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-188840","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-art-project","10":"tag-bloomberg-philanthropies","11":"tag-community-collaboration","12":"tag-homelessness","13":"tag-huemansshelter","14":"tag-midtown","15":"tag-san-antonio","16":"tag-sanantonio","17":"tag-sherman-finch","18":"tag-texas","19":"tag-tx","20":"tag-unhoused-individuals","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115121848587117716","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188840\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}