The Future is Ours

The Future is Ours by artist Ernel Martinez was painted on an exterior wall of South Philadelphia High School in the South Philadelphia neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Painted in two panels separated by a bank of windows this mural is closely related to another mural by Martinez that was located at the school The Shadows Are Mine (since removed). Both murals pull from classical notions of the importance Greek and Romans civilizations placed on education as the key to their future. This is played out in The Future is Ours through two portraits of two students at South Philadelphia High School dressed in not only their normal school clothes but also wrapped in Greco-Roman togas. Each student holds an object connected to education and the arts, and sits in front of a background which repeats the saying “education is key to the future.”

Location Note: Mural no longer on view at this location (replaced by new mural in 2018).