Watch and Read: Ames Street Art the Creation of Community Space

A mandala design of yellows, reds and oranges fills the intersection of South Wilmoth Avenue and Lettie Street.

It's community artwork, and it's also a sign that says but not in words “This street belongs to us.”

The artwork was the result of a painting potluck block party coordinated by Ames Street Art held at the end of June. It was done in the hopes of bringing a somewhat transient college community together by allowing them to reclaim their public space.

“Without a sense of ownership, people have little use of caring for their surroundings. Buildings with short term tenants often fall into cycles of low maintenance, and residents' actions have little consequence. The environment becomes simply a place to provide shelter, and there is no sense of place,” Nitin Gadia and Amy Krause, of Ames Street Art, wrote in a letter to residents during the project's planning stages.

Gadia posed the ordinance allowing such paintings to the City of Ames in 2009, after being inspired by a lecture he watched on ISU campus about a project in Portland, Oregon called City Repair.

Ames approved the ordinance, but Gadia's first intersection didn't meet traffic requirements and his idea stalled.

“I'm very much aligned with the City Repair idea of creating villages in the city,” Gadia said.

In Portland, a neighborhood fought to paint and decorate their street corner to take ownership of their common area. They presented the plan to the city as a way to both improve livability and to calm traffic. They were turned down at first, but that didn't stop them.

They decorated the corners of the intersection with benches and play areas for children. During the painting of the Portland intersection, they played music and had a potluck and some Indian dancers walked down the street and began dancing for the community, Mark Lakeman said during the lecture.

“You don't know really who you live among until you have a social nexus like this in your midst,” he said.

Gadia said he liked Lakeman's idea of creating small self-governing communities in the city and creating places “that we care about on a local level around your own house and your own community.”

Krause learned of Gadia's idea through their friendship and wanted to try it in her neighborhood off of South Wilmoth Avenue and Lettie Street.

During the painting, she said she learned more about the people in her own neighborhood who she wouldn't have met otherwise.

“I met a lot of cool people there I've never met who lived in the neighborhood. That was really nice to see,” Krause said.

Now Krause and Gadia are offering their assistance to other neighborhoods interested in similar projects. A street painting costs $200 or less. Everyone in the neighborhood chips in a can of paint or a couple bucks.

A handful of established neighborhoods have already shown interest in the idea, Krause said.

Gadia said a city should be a cluster of communities but community doesn't work when no one feels a connection to it.

And the street art project should give the community a sense of ownership in a very creative way, he said.

“It's many birds with one stone basically and it's just a fun thing to do,” Gadia said. It's just fun having a block party and just hanging out creating a work of art together.”

Learn more at Ames Street Art Facebook page.