Artolution

Our Mission

The Artolution is a community-based public art organization that seeks to ignite positive social change through creative, participatory and collaborative art making. We facilitate projects around the world that connect diverse peoples in order to address challenges that they face daily and in the future and to develop common social objectives. Our projects bring together children, youth, families, artists, educators and community groups. Our founding objective is to address critical issues related to conflict, trauma, and social marginalization by cultivating sustainable initiatives that promote reconciliation, healing and community empowerment. Our process empowers artists, youth, and communities to be agents of positive social change, explore critical societal issues, and create opportunities for constructive dialogue. Artolution collaborative art projects engage youth and communities that have faced social exclusion and trauma, including refugees, street youth, the incarcerated, people with physical and mental disabilities, and young people living in areas of violent conflict or extreme poverty. These projects have been organized and facilitated in partnership with local artists and educators, grassroots community groups, schools, religious centers, museums and international institutions in over 20 countries across Latin America, Africa, Australia and New Zealand, North America, the Middle East, Europe and South Asia. We utilize visual public art mediums such as mural art and community sculpture, as well as street performance genres including dance, theatre, and music. In our workshops, participants explore important community issues. Supported by us, they collectively decide on the subject and content of the artistic production, culminating in the collaborative creation of works of public art. Through this process, we emphasize the building of positive relationships among participants, skill-building, the sharing of knowledge and the encouragement of community creative activism.