Change Agent | Alexandra Reilinger & Mimi Colson Leaning
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Alie & Nina Reilinger and Mimi Colson-Leaning
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Mural Project Proposal
Alexandra Reilinger & Mikayla Colson Leaning
Our Idea: Murals related to Reduce, Reuse and Recycle that would be painted at Boston Public Schools, T stops, and on electrical boxes with Recycling Bins next to the murals. The murals would engage Boston residents, workers, students, and visitors to Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.
We live in Jamaica Plain, MA. Lots of people on our street care about the environment, and that makes our neighborhood very fun to live in.
Our idea is to have school students and eco-artists paint murals on blank walls at T stops, Boston Public Schools, and on electrical boxes. The murals would be about Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. The students from the school that was having a mural done could participate in the mural in any way they wanted! Any artists interested in becoming green could paint murals on the sides of T stops with the help of anyone who was really excited about helping out.
We think our idea would work because it would not be too expensive and it would be fun for people who painted it. We think that T stops and schools are good places to paint them because lots of people walk past them. They would be hard to miss and they would help people who don’t think about reducing, reusing, and recycling to think about it.
Murals are a great way to show or express a concept, theme or idea. Many people enjoy looking at murals and thinking about what they could symbolize. Even if some murals look as if they would be easy enough to paint, it is very, very difficult.
Why Reduce, Reuse, Recycle?
A lot of people don’t think that reducing, reusing and recycling is very important in this world or they just don’t think about it that much. Our murals will help people to see the reward in reusing, reducing and recycling. The three R’s have a big impact in global warming as well as our livelihood. Americans throw away 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. And that is just plastic bottles. If Americans started recycling and reducing more then we could save a lot of energy. Every glass bottle recycled saves enough energy for a 100-watt light bulb to be lit for 4 hours. The average American creates 56 tons of trash ever year. This is why it is important for Americans to know more about how they can help.
To do this mural project, we will need five things. They are: placement, people, permission, paint, and money.
Placement:
We need to pick a wall that is the right size for a mural. A small wall would probably be best so that the project wouldn’t cost too much or take too long to complete. One possible location for the project would be in a schoolyard where many students would see it, or near a T station, such as Green Street (to go along with our “green” theme), or on an electrical box. So, we are proposing a RRR Mural at 1) Green Street Station, 2) on electrical boxes around the station, or 3) in the Margaret Fuller School playground on Green Street. Probably starting with one site would be the best way to begin the RRR Mural Project. If that is successful, then we can think about doing more. (See attached photos).
People:
According to Heidi Schork, Director of the Mayor’s Mural Crew and an artist who has painted many murals around Boston, designing and producing a mural involves a lot of work. She has advised us to start by picking a reasonable-sized wall and a not too complicated design. Heidi’s mural crew, which consists of a group of high school students and other professional mural artists, has agreed to help work on our project.
We also plan to ask students from Meridian Academy, the school where Mikayla is a student and which currently has students in grades 6 through 10. She told us that at the beginning kids are very enthusiastic about a painting a mural, but as the project progresses they become less interested. It’s clear that we will need to get the help of a very committed crew to complete the painting of the mural. If we were to hire a crew, we would probably have to pay them approximately eight dollars an hour.
Permission:
After a location is selected for the mural, we will need permission from the MBTA, Boston Public Schools, or whoever owns and takes care of the wall or electrical box.
Paint:
We learned from Heidi that it is best not to accept donated paint as it may not be the best quality for producing a mural and may even be paint that the business no longer wants. We need to have the funds to purchase a professional paint, such as Benjamin Moore. To begin, we would need to buy about 1-1/2 gallons of primer, sufficient to cover a small wall before the design is sketched out. It is best to use a tinted primer, since white primer is very bright outside under the sun.
Money:
Primer costs about $120 for five gallons, which is about what we’d need for the size wall we are proposing. The finish paint costs around five dollars a square foot. Instead of seeking paint donations, we could ask for donations of funds, drop cloths, or paint rollers. The material cost for a small size mural (6ft x 8ft) is likely to be around $600. For an electrical box it will be about $200.
Hanging Murals:
Another option for a mural would be to design hanging murals that are painted on a board and can be hung on a wall or even moved to different locations. One place that there are hanging murals is inside T stops. These are good locations for a mural because they would not be permanent and are also protected from the elements. Hanging murals might also be easier to produce because one would not have to climb a ladder to paint them. When they are on the ground, it might also be possible to have more people work on them at the same time and the paint wouldn’t drip down as they were being painted.
Graffiti:
We believe that if our mural looks professional, others will be less likely to paint graffiti over it. It may be helpful if we pick a wall that already has graffiti on it as that would be an excellent way to help the City get rid of the graffiti that has covered so many walls. It is probably best if the mural consisted of pictures without words. Word, according to Heidi, often attract more words. What she means by this is that someone could come along and write something else. For example if we wrote Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, they could write their name under Reduce.
Pictures in Murals:
“You need to put a lot of thought into your mural,” said Heidi. We want to show our message clearly so that people will stop and think about the three R’s: Reduce, Reuse, And Recycle. Pictures are more creative and draw more people to the mural. We would probably also choose not to draw too many humans, because each must be unique and takes a lot of time. Animals, objects, or plants would be easier subjects and we could use animals (similar to animation or a comic strip) to illustrate our story.
Other Accessories:
Another thought we had was to include a Recycling Box or a clothing drop-off next to our mural. A sign should be placed near the project telling people about the mural, why it is important to help, and giving people information about the city’s Recycling Program (Boston’s recycling website). The signs would need to be neat to attract interest and to help prevent graffiti. We think the work in this project will pay off if we can get people to think about littering, how it affects the environment, and can even cause sickness in animals and humans.
Electrical Boxes:
After we talked with Heidi, we came up with the idea of painting electrical boxes, since the light boxes are smaller and easier to paint than murals. There are a lot of electrical boxes around Green Street station that we could paint, one of which has some graffiti on it. This means that kids from Meridian Academy, a school in Brookline where Mimi goes, could help paint with us. The light boxes are also small, so the kids wouldn’t get tired of the project so quickly.
Mural Painting Ideas:
REUSE: Show a bottle, and then make branches off that show what the bottle could be made into.
REDUCE: Show a scene of a green space on one side, and then show the same scene, but polluted with piles of garbage & factories.
RECYCLE: Have a comic strip showing what happens to trash that you throw out – how it is recycled.
All the murals would have a recycle symbol in them.
Donations:
A mural needs a lot of attention and care. Not only does a mural need a lot of care, it also needs a lot of money. If the City likes our project, we could ask some Boston-based businesses or big companies like Coca-Cola to help fund it.
REDUCE REUSE RECYCLE MURAL PROJECT - PROPOSED SITES
Green Street Station MBTA stop in Jamaica Plain,MA.
Electrical Boxes near Green Street Station. (with graffiti) .
Former Fuller School playground wall
Letters Supporting Our Project
March 6, 2009
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Mural Project
As Director of the Mayor’s Mural Crew since 1991, I have had the unique opportunity of working with hundreds of talented young people from the City of Boston on mural projects that become neighborhood landmarks and that have made significant contributions to the cultural patrimony of our city. A few weeks ago I was happy to meet Alexandra Reilinger and Mikayla Colson Leaning, two serious elementary and middle school students with a great idea!
Alexandra and Mikayla asked me to advise them on the technical aspects of mural painting; materials needed, site concerns and budgeting specifics. I was help to answer all of their questions and at the same time offer the assistance of the Mayor’s Mural Crew if they find a site that might require experienced artists to get the job done!
I am so pleased that Alexandra and Mikayla have recognized the impact that a mural can have as a way to communicate a message. I am delighted to be able to support their efforts to create awareness about recycling in Boston and look forward to seeing the finished product.
Yours truly,
Heidi Schork, Director
The Mayor’s Mural Crew
Mayor’s Office of Arts, Tourism & Special Events
City of Boston
Mark Adams is an eco-artist we’d ask to help out with painting a mural.
To whom it may concern:
I am a geographic information professional with the National Park Service and an environmental teacher and artist and I want to bring to your attention Alie Reilinger, a talented and creative elementary schooler with some big ideas. She has a great intuition about simple solutions to environmental problems and is wise beyond her years. She was recognized for a noteworthy recommendation about resetting margins in city offices that could save reams of paper -- the idea was so simple that the adults missed it. I have known Alie most of her life and am continually impressed by her thoughtfulness and good values. I wholeheartedly recommend her to Pitch the City for her Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Mural Project. Her idea to combine public art murals with recycling stations would bring vibrancy and a message to the public townscape of Boston.
Thanks for your consideration,
Mark Adams
PO Box 727
North Truro MA 02652
508-380-5354, chillmark13@yahoo.com
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KatherineWalsh
April 16, 2009 - 11:19pm
April 16, 2009 - 11:19pm
Congratulations girls, I was hoping you would win! This will be a great way to recycle, reuse, beautify the city, educate the city, and allow residents to be involved in creating something great for their neighborhoods.
Victoria-Carruth
June 3, 2009 - 10:35pm
June 3, 2009 - 10:35pm
I am looking forward to hearing more about your murals on trash compactors, walls, and other places of interest is a great way to get involved and for people to take notice of the new graffiti.
I would like to incorporate something like this for my Kids Club of Copper Basin to get involved in for our community. Go to: www.carruthandassociate.org to see my kids club.
Keep up the goood work!
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March 11, 2009 - 1:14pm
Murals in the form of grafitti have been all over cities for years and years and years. This project will be perfect to change that from a form of vandalism to art. Personally I'm a huge believer in the impact that a visual representation has on mankind's intellect and emotion. Your murals will have the power to motivate people to do every day, simple things to green their lives. Maybe if someone walks by a picture of a water bottle being recycled instead of trashed, they'll think about it next time they're done with a plastic bottle and chose to chuck it in the recycling instead of garbage. And I bet you may even inspire grafitti artists to start greenin' their art as well!