Southwest Roots

In August 2015, the Mural Arts Philadelplhia and Bartram’s Garden received a creative placemaking grant from ArtPlace America for a project named Southwest Roots, which connected the needs and interests of residents in Southwest Philadelphia to the cultural and natural assets of Bartram’s Garden, the oldest botanical garden in the US and historic homestead of John Bartram, and to a new river trail development. Situated on the Schuylkill River, both the park and the neighborhood have a complex and rich history of residential, agricultural, industrial, transportation, and commercial uses that present many opportunities to make connections between the contemporary Garden, the river, and its neighbors.

Curated by Sarah Schultz, Mural Arts and Bartram’s hosted a variety of projects and programs from spring 2016 through fall 2017 led by both artists and community members that extended the garden’s reach into the surrounding neighborhood and increased opportunities for neighbors to connect to nature. The projects included:

Listening School

Listening School was a mobile structure for learning and sharing ideas about healing and the meaning of the places we inhabit and make home. For the period of the project, artist Katie Bachler and a team of eight high school students from John Bartram High School moved throughout this Southwest Philadelphia neighborhood, listening and learning about what matters to people.

Neighborhood Yes Fund

Neighborhood Yes Fund provided support for existing projects and new collaborations initiated by residents in the nearby Bartram’s neighborhood. Guided by a community advisory board, Yes Fund participants received a modest stipend to help them realize ideas that looked to support creative expression, connections with nature, community well-being, and/or youth expression. In return, recipients commited to sharing the experience of their projects with one another.

Included among the first of three phases of Yes Fund projects awarded stipends was an early childhood fair at Woodland Academy and Bartram’s Garden; a youth video mentoring program; Bartram’s Village’s basketball League Tournament; and West Philly Kickback Festival, a free concert to promote peace and unity in Southwest Philadelphia.

BG Bed

BG Bed was a pilot vegetable gardening project conceived, created, and implemented by 15 neighborhood youth working with the Community Farm and Food Resource Center, a Bartram’s Garden-based program to support food sovereignty and youth training efforts in the Southwest Philadelphia community. Since its founding in 2012, the farm has been a hub for learning, sharing, and growth—not to mention delicious food.

Responding to nearby residents’ requests for raised bed gardens at their homes, BG Bed provided home vegetable gardening kits to residents living within walking distance of Bartram’s Garden, as well as plant starts, follow-up visits, and advice.

Six Seeds for Southwest

Inspired by the story of Brer Rabbit and the Briar Patch, Brooklyn-based artist Aisha Cousins created a plant-based art project to help Black Philadelphians who live or work in Southwest Philadelphia initiate a series of philosophical conversations about their neighborhood. Nine neighbors worked with Cousins and Bartram’s Garden Land Manager Todd Greenberg to create sculptural planters meant to spark conversation. Living barbed plants, like roses or hawthorn trees, became a metaphor for how a community’s “thorns” sometimes create safe spaces for incredibly beautiful things to grow, and how removing too many of these metaphorical thorns can make local treasures vulnerable.

Artist Catalyst

The Artist Catalyst was an eight-month artist residency at Bartram’s Garden that tested innovative approaches and public projects that used arts and culture to build connections between the garden and its neighborhood. The duration of the residency was designed to foster strong relationships that can help identify priorities for the neighborhood and the organizations working there, and generate authentic social, economic, and creative opportunities for residents.

BARETEETH was chosen as the 2017 Southwest Roots Artist Catalyst.

Southwest Roots was a companion project of Mural Arts’ Art@Bartram’s, a multi-year initiative begun in 2015 focused on the development and production of public art projects in and around Bartram’s Garden, Bartram’s Mile, and the surrounding neighborhood that looked to connect the public to the Schuylkill River, raise awareness of water-related environmental concerns, and promote environmental stewardship. This related body of work is supported by the William Penn Foundation.

Location Note: Works/projects no longer on view at this location (temporary projects).