Capturing Community - Bridge Building Through Story in the Digital Age...

...is an arts and technology centered outreach program focused on visual storytelling and social connectedness via the documentary arts.

This project illuminates Pittsburgh, Adair Park, Capitol View, and Capitol View Manor’s rich history to build community bridges into the future inspired by personal stories of the past. By bringing local artists and residents together through interviews and intimate photography, the project empowers elders and youth to capture and share personal narratives.

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Neighborhood residents are the core of Capturing Community. TCP places major focus on nurturing relationships, building community, and encouraging feedback to frame its programs. Our role as a cultural agent reaches far beyond TCP’s everyday programming. We build long lasting authentic friendships with our outreach communities, artists, partners, patrons, and community leaders. We encourage their connections to each other, collaborations, and the expansion of dialogue. We invite these groups to introduce us to their audiences and vice versa. This dynamic allows everyone to take part in our process of community building with a sense of ownership and pride.

pictured left: TCP youth beneficiaries of Blueprint 58-Adair Park participate in "Capturing Community" funded by the National Endowment for the Arts.

A Community Connection Council has been established to support Capturing Community. The council includes residents of the area who not only possess a deep knowledge of the community’s historical and cultural data, they are passionate individuals with strong community and social ties that span the breadth of the area. Youth participants are recruited and recommended by the council as well as interviewees who live and work in the area. The council further helps to engage the community at large through the disbursement of invitations to residents to attend workshops, exhibitions, and discussions. Local business involvement is encouraged through the hosting of events and workshops. Are you a resident of the above mentioned neighborhoods? JOIN OUR COUNCIL.

Funding for this program is provided by The National Endowment for the Arts.

Funding for this program is provided by The National Endowment for the Arts.

 

THE IMAGES & TEXT BELOW ARE SAMPLES FROM OUR OLD FOURTH WARD PROJECT:

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Creative Loafing’s Neighborhood Guide launched the Do Good campaign, a series of grassroots partnerships with local neighborhoods to help them realize goals and projects they haven’t been able to accomplish on their own. The goal was to strengthen ties between neighbors as well as between neighborhoods and the greater Atlanta community.

ABOUT OUR PROJECT: The Creatives Project, Capitol View, and Capitol View Manor's Anti Littering Campaign & Beautification Project was selected for match funding!

This anti-littering campaign encouraged our residents to take pride in their streets and build healthy disposal habits amongst our neighbors especially our youth.

TCP Professional artists worked with the community to create original art for designated trash cans to be installed on highly polluted streets and corners. We created logo/campaign signage and collateral to educate the community about anti-littering. Artists worked with the CV(M) communities to design, plan, and execute this neighborhood beautification project while engaging neighborhood youth, residents, businesses and organizations. It was our goal to inspire and support the unity of our community through the involvement of fun art projects that brightened up our neighborhood!

Below you can view the process from start to finish!

THE CAMPAIGN:

THE IMPACT:

A Do Good summer camp curriculum was facilitated with youth attending Perkerson Park's Camp Best Friends. It was designed to empower youth to become ambassadors of change through a service oriented arts curriculum. Participants learned to take pride in the beauty of their clean streets while building healthy disposal habits and teaching others to do the same. They created a large work of art with the use of recycled materials they collected during neighborhood clean ups. They worked with GOOD CLEAN DESIGN to create a campaign motto and logo to correspond with the release of an anti-littering newsletter and went door to door within the community to educate neighbors about the positive effects of anti-littering.

After a successful fundraising campaign trash cans were ordered and installed to include the logo and slogan created by youth residents.

CLICK ON THE IMAGE BELOW TO VIEW THE FULL IMPACT GALLERY and ...

read the Creative Loafing Article HERE.

Capture AT PERKERSON

The CAPTURE Project, TCP's signature outreach program, is an arts and technology workshop focused on visual storytelling and social connectedness via the documentary arts.

The CAPTURE Project empowers youth in Atlanta’s most impoverished neighborhoods to document and share their stories of community through personal interviews and intimate photography. The results are shared with residents and businesses to cultivate a stronger sense of community and connection.

In 2013 TCP piloted the Capture Project with the youth of Big Bethel AME Church and Perkerson Elementary school. Please check out behind the scenes images from our time with these young talents below and email us for more information about our program! Our work with Perkerson was generously supported by TARGET and local residents.

PERKERSON MURAL

TCP created arts education programming around the development of a mural for the youth and staff of Perkerson Elementary School. Resident artists MAO and Brandon Sadler worked closely with students to conceptualize, design, and install a large scale mural in the entry area of the school to help create a colorful, inspiring, and inviting atmosphere for students teachers, faculty, staff, and visitors.

To date, TCP has provided subsidized housing to eight local artist in the neighborhoods of Adair Park and Pittsburgh. In exchange these resident fellows have given over 3,072 hours of their time trough arts mentorship and outreach to support Atlanta's underserved communities through TCP's Community Arts Program (CAP).

Read more about how this program has impacted the lives of Atlanta's emerging creative talents here.

Learn more about TCP's Creative Community Housing Program (CCHP) and view the portfolios of our resident fellows here.

 

You voted Our Executive Director, Neda Abghari, as one of eleven Neighborhood MVP's for Creative Loafing's 2015 Neighborhood Issue!

Neda Abghari | Capitol View ManorPhotographer, educator, and founder of arts organization the Creatives Project Neda Abghari grew up in Tucker, but she's lived in her current corner of town since 2000. When she saw how her younger neighbors were gro…

Neda Abghari | Capitol View Manor

Photographer, educator, and founder of arts organization the Creatives Project Neda Abghari grew up in Tucker, but she's lived in her current corner of town since 2000. When she saw how her younger neighbors were growing up, she took notice of what was missing, and took action to fill the gaping holes she saw.

People are really enthusiastic about keeping the neighborhood diverse. We all try to stick together because we’re used to being ignored. I watched the youth grow up and not have many outlets and thought, “Why not establish a housing residency for artists in southwest Atlanta?” [Through the Creatives Project] Masud Olufani, along with a few others, were named housing recipients. We began to do outreach with Perkerson Elementary school.

— As told to Ed Hall

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