Transition Goals

244 E 106th Street

Concept

The lot is located on the south side of E 106th Street, a busy throughway in the neighborhood. Vacant for years, the lot was often overgrown with weeds or litter that blew in through the gaps in the fence. Construction on the planned building at the site was not scheduled to begin for a couple of years.

Mission
AND sought a way to beautify the long-vacant site using public art, a technique that has been implemented in several areas in East Harlem. This was an opportunity to announce the ShareNYC project before construction began.

Visioning
In July 2021, Dakotah West held a Community Visioning Session with several clients of Ali Forney Center. Through sketching and talking, the clients and the artist distilled key themes, images, characters, patterns, colors, and text of the mural. 

“I’ve done that activity a million times,” artist Dakotah West said, “but this time it actually gave me goosebumps.”

Process

About the mural

Transition Goals is based on the clients' messages for the next generation of queer youth and installed on four panels on a fence. Each panel expresses a distinct quality of water embodied in human form, juxtaposed with a line of a poem that speaks to the fluidity, monumentality, labor, ephemerality, and grief of transitions and changes:

I would be water flowing in one direction.
I would be a tsunami.
I would be sweat.
I would be mist. I would be missed.

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Painting & Installing


Panels were painted on light-weight canvas and then adhered to large wooden panels. This installation technique ensures that the artwork can be moved once the building is under construction.

The result is a vibrant and dynamic mural filled with symbolism about hope and aspiration in the face of change. Water is life, and life, like water, can take many forms. Strength and vulnerability radiate from the mural, affirming and celebrating the transformative forces of life.

Details

Photos

Groundswell NYC

Groundswell is a NYC-based organization that brings together youth, artists, and community organizations to use art as a tool for social change, for a more just and equitable world.

“The mission of the Ali Forney Center is to protect homeless Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Questioning youths from the harms of homelessness and empower them with the tools needed to be independent.”
—via Ali Forney Center

AFC is the largest non-profit organization dedicated to LGBTQ+ homeless youth in the country and will be providing onsite social services for the ShareNYC residents.