SCAD SERVE adds a ‘POP’ of color to the community with new Paint Our Parks initiative

If you’ve recently spent your hot summer days at Adair Park I or Arthur Langford Jr. Park here in Atlanta, you may have noticed a vibrant revamp on the basketball courts. Where old and tattered blacktop once stood, now the community enjoys bold artwork underneath their sneakers as they dribble up and down the court. These murals are all thanks to a team of over 100 volunteers affiliated with SCAD SERVE, who combined their creative superpowers to create striking showpieces.

SCAD SERVE, which started as a student club nearly two decades ago, has evolved with an incredible reach. One of the organization’s latest public art initiatives is affectionally called SCAD POP, which stands for Paint Our Parks. 

“SCAD SERVE has transformed from a student club into a community-focused design studio, which supports the SCAD POP initiative itself,” says senior SCAD SERVE fellow Mukundi Kamwendo, an international student from Harare, Zimbabwe. “The goal of SCAD POP is to beautify public spaces and raise the quality of life of community members.”

“SCAD SERVE is our community service design studio,” says Dean James Ballas, the Senior Executive Director of Design for Good. “We as a collective SCAD community listen to the needs of our neighbors, we identify what their creative challenges are and we develop meaningful design solutions that enhance quality of life in our hometowns of Atlanta and Savannah.”

“Our SCAD POP initiative was originally envisioned by President Wallace,” he says. “I am elated that we as a collaborative team have brought this creative design-for-good concept to fruition.”

SCAD POP serves to unite the community through volunteer action in our local parks. “A volunteer can be anyone in our SCAD community — students, alumni, faculty and staff,” says Ballas. “Whether you’re a skilled M.F.A. painting student or you’ve never painted with a brush before, you are welcome to join our creative cause,” says Ballas.

“The opportunity here is to connect with our own SCAD family,” he adds. “We work with SCAD alumni who are already making their mark on the world through public art, and we invite them back to the hive to guide and mentor our volunteers in the creation of these transformative murals.” 

“Part of our creative superpower is the talented alumni network that we have,” Kamwendo says. “The alumni design [the murals], and then SCAD SERVE volunteers, including myself and other fellows, participate in painting them. It ends up being this big paint-by-numbers, which is really fun.”

“The SCAD SERVE team collaborates very closely with each muralist,” adds Ballas. “But first, we work with the mayor’s office, the Department of Parks and Recreation and the Neighborhood Planning Unit, as well as the members of the community itself.”

After completing the first SCAD POP project with alumni muralist Emily Eldridge (B.F.A., Illustration, 2004) at Arthur Langford Jr. Park last fall, The SCAD SERVE team began searching for other basketball courts to transform in the Atlanta and Savannah areas.

“As soon as I walked through Adair Park I, Alex Waggoner (B.F.A., Painting, 2012) came to mind,” says Ballas. The first thing that he noticed when visiting the park were the 1920s bungalows lining its perimeter. “Alex’s work is inspired by Southern architecture, and she integrates a lot of natural elements in her murals.”

It was a match made in heaven. “Alex had to be our SCAD POP muralist at Adair Park I,” Ballas continues. “It was just a perfect alignment.”

Once Adair Park I was selected as SCAD POP’s next mural location, Ballas and his team developed three distinct design concepts for the court that were presented to the Neighborhood Planning Unit. “The design that was chosen is near and dear to the community,” says Ballas. 

Although the mural is beautiful on the surface, its meaning goes much deeper than that. Turns out, the mural colorfully pays homage to its Native American roots. “That land [in Adair Park I] was originally Muscogee nation land, and the Muscogee people utilize sun iconography in their artwork,” explains Ballas. “So, Alex’s mural is a brilliant bridge and connection to the original roots of the neighborhood. It’s one of the reasons the mural option was selected by the community.”

Each of the three murals that have been completed so far are vastly different from one another, with elements of the community woven into each. “Every innovative design solution has a concept — a story behind it,” Ballas says. “It is up to us as creative innovators to bring that story to life. Every one of these SCAD POP murals will be designed in the flavor and vibe of the neighborhood, as well as the voice of the artist.”

Kamwendo agrees. “Every mural will never really be the same,” she adds. “Because they’re all in different areas with their own different stories to tell.”

According to Ballas, the basketball court at Adair Park I used to be fully-functioning. But several years ago, the poles and the backboards were removed from the court due to crime in the area. By the time Ballas and his team selected the park as a potential SCAD POP location, the court was just a weathered, worn and cracked blacktop surface.

“So, we invested in resurfacing the basketball court for a refinished surface that will ensure the mural’s longevity,” he says. SCAD fully funded the purchase of new poles, new backboards and tennis court paint for the project — mixed with silica sand to make it more durable.

Once the court was resurfaced, Waggoner, Ballas and their team of SCAD SERVE volunteers got to work, drenched in the summer heat. “For Alex’s mural, we had over 100 volunteers,” says Ballas. “Nine, ten hours a day in the heat and the humidity and [the volunteers] were all just devoted to uplifting our community.”

“When the volunteers come, whether it’s for the four-hour shift or the three-hour shift, the alumni will talk through their creative process,” Kamwendo says. “Covering everything from how they got to their design, how they incorporated the client — which is the neighborhood and what the history of the park is to keep it true to the area.”

Although Kamwendo has been involved with SCAD SERVE since her first quarter at SCAD, the mural at Adair Park I was her first experience with Paint Our Parks.

“I was really hands-on with Alex, helping her do the finishing touches in terms of getting ready to apply the paint,” she says. Kamwendo also helped her fellow volunteers apply the colors to the court afterwards.

When asked what working with alumni mentor Alex Waggoner was like, Kamwendo admits that she was initially a little nervous. “You’re always kind of nervous when you work with a SCAD alum, especially if you’ve seen their work before.”

“But she’s very gentle, super kind and helpful, which made learning how to paint on the ground a lot easier for me,” Kamwendo continues. “And I think she showed us the spirit of being a creative — but she also showed us that it’s not just about the final product; it’s about why we’re doing this. To serve the community, to beautify the space and to increase the quality of life of the surrounding people. And with Alex … I feel that heavily with her.”

And while she learned a lot from her alumni mentor, Kamwendo also brought some of her own knowledge from her SCAD courses into her community service work as well. She recalls that both Waggoner and Ballas inadvertently pointed this out to her during her time as a SCAD POP volunteer at Adair Park I.

“Alex and Dean were telling the crew and I about how throughout their mural designing, they needed to make sure that everything was on the right scale,” she says. “And it brought back these memories from geometry class, where I once was like, ‘Oh, I’ll never need to know this.’”

She laughs. “You see, all these design concepts in foundations [courses] that I thought were silly, are truly the foundation of what you’re going to create,” says Kamwendo. “I thought I wasn’t learning anything, but I was.”

Kamwendo has also had similar experiences in other SCAD SERVE volunteer events as well. “So far, I’ve helped with Salvation Army and food distribution,” she says. “And I’ve also been able to go to community gardens here in Atlanta.”

“But I remember going to Salvation Army, and it was during a time when I was studying about food insecurity in one of my classes,” Kamwendo continues. “It was really interesting to get the perspective of the people that work in the kitchen, and to have that insight from class as well.”

But geometry and food insecurity aren’t the only concepts that Kamwendo has held onto throughout her time as a SCAD SERVE fellow. “College, to me, has never been just academics,” says Kamwendo. “I feel as though I’ve learned the softer skills of leadership and coordination from being a [SCAD SERVE] fellow, but also through communicating with organizers and asking questions.”

Kamwendo hopes that she’s inspired the SCAD community to get involved on campus, regardless of the organization. “Beyond SCAD SERVE, I would encourage students to be involved in anything, anywhere,” she says. 

“Even if you, for example, aren’t a film major but someone needs help filming something,” Kamwendo continues. “I really do suggest it because as much as I’ve learned about others surrounding the Atlanta community as an international student, I’ve also learned about the students here at SCAD and I’ve been able to connect with a lot more people that way.”

If you’re interested in getting involved with SCAD SERVE, sign up for an account on their website. “You can pick what kind of needs you’re interested in based on our four pillars: food, clothing, shelter, and environment,” says Kamwendo. “And you’re also able to track how many hours you’ve served.”

“Volunteering with SCAD SERVE is so much fun,” Kamwendo says. “If it’s not for the hot sun on the basketball court, it’s for the people that will be impacted by the basketball court. And I think to better know your community, you have to be in it and experience it to find ways to make it better.”

And as for the Paint Our Parks initiative, be on the lookout for more murals throughout the community in the future. “We have numerous courts, easily ten to twelve different courts that are in development right now in both Atlanta and Savannah,” Ballas says. If you’re interested in volunteering with SCAD SERVE to install a future mural, be sure to sign up soon at scad.galaxydigital.com.