Mural in WRJ and Solarpunk: Art and Energy Meet
Its days are numbered.
Check out the blank wall—that seems to go on forever—before it’s gone. (See above.) There’s a mural in progress in downtown White River Junction. A long, south-facing expanse of brick has brought together Dartmouth’s Energy Justice Clinic with COVER Home Repair and arts-related and other constituencies to add some color to the neighborhood. It is part of and has grown out of an overall effort to shed some light on changes in energy policies and practices with an eye toward “a just energy transition.”
What is that? I turned to Dr. Sarah H. Kelly, Co-Director (with Dr. Maron Greenleaf, Assistant Professor of Anthropology) of Dartmouth’s Energy Justice Clinic and participant in the mural project for a definition:
“A just energy transition forefronts equity and justice in the restructuring of our energy system to reduce greenhouse gases. One major theme is the potential of the transition to renewable energy to address entrenched social inequity by including programs and policies that support income precarious people and minority communities to also benefit from the transition. Energy insecurity refers to the condition of living with high energy costs, poor physical conditions, and insufficient coping strategies to live in those conditions; energy security is often invisible, yet it holds negative health and social consequences.”
Many Upper Valley residents know and live with energy insecurity every day, trying to cope with ever-rising energy costs, substandard housing, poor insulation, windows that rattle in the wind. And it hurts. New and fair energy initiatives are needed. Art may not fix everything, but it has a role to play.
While the painting of the mural itself is scheduled for this May, the planning has been underway since last fall. Here’s a brief history from EJC Director Kelly:
The project began in September 2022 with COVER staff, Energy Justice Clinic (EJC) mentors, the artist Ragko, and Dartmouth students. Over time, the mural has really become community oriented. The EJC and COVER saw a mural as an opportunity to engage the community in co-creating public art that would be for and by the neighborhood and the larger community. The mural project was in addition to EJC students doing workdays for home repairs (largely energy efficiency projects for mobile homes) with COVER.
In November, this resulted in a community mural workshop at the Center for Cartoon Studies. Based on that feedback, Ragko and COVER hosted a zoom community workshop on the mural design. Sharing the design online and via COVER’s community and the Dartmouth listserv, we elicited a lot of community input (over 140 responses).
You’ve heard of steampunk? In addition to the mural in White River Junction, Kelly and the Energy Justice Clinic are launching a second art-focused project —a solarpunk initiative at Dartmouth, curated by and for students. Following a call for submissions, one student or group will be chosen and funded to create an artwork by the end of May. What’s solarpunk?
Solarpunk is a literary and environmental art movement to imagine and create alternative futures with the sun and solar power. Here is a description from an article in Built In: “Solarpunk is a sci-fi subgenre and social movement that emerged from the internet in 2008. Solarpunk’s aesthetic visualizes collectivist, ecological utopias where nature and technology grow in harmony.” [The article is a great read, citing the iconic Art Nouveau Paris metro entrance as an “aesthetic touchstone” for solarpunk.]
Artful will be following both of these projects and will post updates. For more information on the mural project, additional photos, and suggestions for how you can donate and volunteer, please click here.
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And in case you are wondering . . . Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.