Kansas City Grows Up is an interactive food forest mural. Colorful vegetables and fruits sprout from underground to create a canopy of delicious crops, where viewers can enjoy details of life in every corner. The soil harbors a nest of roots, microorganisms, bugs, and naturally, food itself. In the weeks leading up to painting, passersby voted on their favorite foods and creatures they wanted to see in the work. Anything from potatoes, radishes, and carrots or more surprising crops like peanuts, ginger, and asparagus! The possibilities were endless–and truly up to the city!

The shelter is lush, bursting with life, as if to wrap waiting passengers in a blanket of green, and also has a delightful amount of space for people to see themselves in amongst the edible jungle. These considerations allow for plenty of fun interaction with the piece, from games of peekaboo to photos for social media. The goal is to create not only a unique experience to see the art up close and learn new things about food, but to also see oneself in the art, as if they too are born from the soil.
Aren’t we, after all?

2020, Latex Paint on Hoophouse
Artists Statement (reading level 6 and up)
I-Spy Handout

located at 4429 Forest Avenue, Kansas City, MO 64110

A mural for the hoop style greenhouse in Manheim Gardens; with a community focused design centered around inclusion, education, and growth. Painted with caution during the summer of 2020 with the help of many volunteers, the Hoophouse mural was a way for neighbors to stay safely connected and have a lifelong memory of the garden. 

Crucial to this mural’s community goals, togetherness, was involving as much of the garden’s extended family as was safely possible. In order to spread the word, we invited folks through the neighborhood association, and dropped flyers at every residence in Manheim Park. Many people who hadnn’t wielded a paintbrush since childhood jumped in with glee to make their mark on our garden.

How did we do it? Simple!

After painting a base coat of each season’s color, we projected the lineart design onto the hoophouse with permanent markers; these two sessions completed in one day. Then the artist prepared a color-guide that guest artists would follow to mix colors, the printout was placed in a plastic sleeve so artists could easily test their mixed color against the real one. Of course, some creative deviation was allowed and encouraged! Particularly in the sketch stage, I urged people to draw a little something of their own in the design. 

In a year so full of hurt and anxiety, this proved a welcome distraction for neighbors young and old. It was hugely validating to see people change their mind about their own artistic abilities

Mural painted on the outside of a Yard Bird Roost in Manheim Gardens, done in the late fall of 2019. A motif of multicolored chicken feathers and eggs decorate a positively theatrical structure in the center of midtown Kansas City.