Speaker Series:
Socially engaged art practice and collaborative design for a more just future
Time: 12:00pm
Location: Online
Leidy Burgos
Leidy Burgos is a Philadelphia Pennsylvania born and raised native. She is an experienced artist and gardener, mainly participating in Mural arts and gardening community projects in Fairhill’s Kensington Neighborhood of Philadelphia. After attending the now-closed Art Institute of Philadelphia for two years, motherhood and her diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis had her opt out. But this helped Burgos to focus on healing and helping others to heal by sharing her stories of survival of domestic violence and living with Multiple Sclerosis. Burgos likes to show others ways to cope and move on through art, gardening and community.
Sulay Sosa
Sulay Sosa is an active community leader in Southeast Philadelphia and an organizer of the Latina Moms initiative. Sosa is invested in improving her community for her children and all neighbors. After Sosa learned more about global warming, she understood that this is something that affects all of us, and the importance of working towards change starting within our own houses and communities. Sosa has been an important organizer and leader in the Southwark schoolyard transformation project with Mural Arts for more than four years.
Shari Hersh
Shari Hersh is the Director of the Environmental Justice Department at Mural Arts Philadelphia, artist and activist, organizes and facilitates public art projects and processes that convene people of diverse backgrounds and disciplines to mobilize for and enact Environmental Justice. Durational by design, Hersh’s project sites prioritize horizontal collaborations and distributive leadership, in order to precipitate exploration, discussion, and learning that deconstruct white supremacy and colonialism. Moving from individualism to collectivism, the work reconsiders art and authorship as a collaborative enterprise and art as a platform for change. These projects realize the necessity of mutuality and collectivism in order to build a more just future. Hersh was one of the movement editors on Phlassembled (Jeanne van Heeswijk, PMA 2017) which told the story of radical community building and active resistance in Philadelphia. She has facilitated art and activism projects in the public sphere for over twenty years.
Gamar Markarian
Gamar Markarian is a design strategist and urbanist interested in forms of communication and lives in New York. Born to an Armenian-Lebanese Family, Markarian received my BS in Landscape Design and Ecosystem Management in 2005 from the American University of Beirut (AUB) Lebanon, where she also pursued an MS in Urban Design. She earned an MsC in Design and Urban Ecologies (2016) from Parsons/The New School and in 2018 she received a graduate certification in Documentary Media Studies from the School of Public Engagement/The New School. In 2008, Markarian cofounded Atelier Hamra; a landscape architecture office in Beirut, Lebanon. She has also taught and worked at AUB, EARTH University, Costa Rica and Parsons The New School for Design for over 10 years. Markarian has worked as a research associate at the Healthy Materials Lab at Parsons, New York. She is currently an independent consultant collaborating with Philadelphia Mural Arts Program’s Environmental Justice Department.