Piece by Piece: Strengthening Community Through Art

Income inequality

Expand existing project, program, or initiative (expanding and continuing ongoing, successful work)

In spite of some progress, Los Angeles still has the second largest population of homeless in the country. The very real human price of homelessness is isolation (recognized by the U.S. Surgeon General as a National Mental Health Crisis) and trauma. For 16+ years Piece by Piece has been training formerly homeless individuals in the art of mosaic design and production. Most participants come to us with monthly incomes of less than $800. By teaching a therapeutic art practice in a safe and welcoming place our programs empower participants to explore their creativity while gaining the technical skills that provide an opportunity for earned income. Sustaining these FREE mosaic training workshops is essential to our work, helping others - like the thousands of participants we have served - acquire marketable/functional life skills, build a sense of purpose and wellbeing, earn supplemental income, achieve financial/socio-emotional stability, and create lasting connections through community.

Support from LA2050 will help Piece by Piece fulfill our mission of empowering formerly homeless and/or very-low income individuals to rebuild their lives while building community through a collaborative art practice. Participants attend free professionally led workshops to progress through four levels of certification. Artists may sell their own mosaic creations on our website and retain 70% of the sale price. And as they progress through certified levels, they become eligible to work on commissioned projects of increasing complexity (awards, plaques, home wares, and large-scale murals) to earn supplemental income.
As with all projects, “Strengthening Community Through Art" will be led by our professional instructors - guiding certified artists - in the design, manufacture, and installation of a community inspired mosaic mural created for the exterior wall of a new Community Center on the campus of the Westbrook Academy in South Gate opening in August 2024. Making this project quite unique, Westbrook Academy students, their families, and other members of the community will be invited to participate in Piece by Piece workshops - held at the Community Center - to help make module mosaic pieces based on a community-informed design. All community-made modules will be integrated into the final mural. This project also helps realize the vision of the LA Promise Fund to launch the Community Center as an integral part of the Westbrook Academy Campus and the community at large.

We hold that the arts, in all forms, speak in a universal language that can bridge divides within community, foster creativity, and serve as a mirror for society to influence introspection and self-discovery. And we have witnessed participation in creative arts manifest transformative experiences, help heal trauma, instill confidence, self-reliance, and restore a sense of purpose for participants. And “There is a growing body of research exploring how the arts contribute to wellbeing at the community level. Recent studies suggest that arts and cultural practices enhance social cohesion, preserve culturally relevant social capital, and contribute to healthy communities.” ​– Pesata et al. (2022) Engaging the Arts for Wellbeing in the United States of America: A Scoping Review. Our model (successfully deployed across LA) offers an opportunity to financially support our artists, engage students/families in South Gate, and collectively strengthen community "piece by piece' through art.

Piece by Piece tracks multitude of metrics on a monthly/annual basis including: attendance (in-person and online), community members reached (through events), artist retention, new artists, the number artists Certified, artist earned income, field trips, popup sales, web-sales, individual giving, meals served (to mitigate participant food insecurity), wares made/sold, grants income, self-assessed wellbeing, and even pounds of recycled materials used. Measurement of success for the project specific to this grant application will include: the number of students, family members, and community members that will have participated in the public workshops, their pre/post attitudes towards community-based engagement, student satisfaction with the project, and earned income for our instructors and working artist.
While not yet confirmed, we anticipate engaging the city of South Gate to help with a long term assessment of the larger community's response to the mural and community center.