Amachi Pittsburgh Mural Project “Youth Constitution – Creating Rules to Live By”

Amachi Pittsburgh is a collaborative initiative that provides mentors to children who have an incarcerated parent. (Referred to throughout this proposal as “Children of Prisoners”. According to the National Institute of Corrections Federal Resource Center for Children of Prisoners, without intervention as high as 70 percent of children of prisoners will themselves become incarcerated as adults. The U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics has described this group as more at-risk than any other subculture in the country. They may also be among those most deeply affected by the current economic crisis. According to a 2007 Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report, about half of parents in state prison provided the primary financial support for their minor children.
The Amachi Pittsburgh Mural Project will give a voice to these often forgotten children within our society. Titled, “Youth Constitution – Creating Rules to Live By” the proposed mural will be similar to the American Constitution in that it will provide a forum in which youth can identify principles and values (or rules) that will ultimately empower them to reach beyond their current situation and write their own futures.
The mural will be approximately 10’ x 15’ and will consist of several hundred individual tiles of different sizes and dimensions that will be a depiction of each child’s “Rule to Live By”. By serving children ages 4-18 these rules can range from, “I promise not to lie” to “I promise to hug my teddy bear each day”, and will be an incorporation of poetry, favorite quotes, and casts of items that the youth seek to share. Guided by nationally renowned artist, Bob Qualters and Allison Rhodes, owner of Color Me Mine ceramics studio, all items will be developed into a color scheme that will blend together so that when viewed at a distance, observers will see a larger image similar to those in the paintings of Chuck Close (see attached Smiling Child).