stencil street art: examining consumerism and social problems in west baltimore

Jessie and I planned this project to accomplish three things with our teen students: to understand how street art can be a powerful art form and tool for social change, to think critically about consumerism and the way that advertising affects us, and to examine issues in our own communities that we want to speak out about. We wanted the activity to be a way of subverting the methods that corporations use to market to us. Once we identified the tricks that companies use to sell us stuff we don't need, we asked the teens to use those tricks in their stencil artwork--catchy slogans and images that will catch peoples' attention. But instead of using these tricks to sell things, we used them to convey our ideas. We used temporary chalk spraypaint to stencil our slogans on historic Pennsylvania Avenue in West Baltimore.

Teen students stenciling one of the slogans they came up with based on our discussions: Teach us, don't fear us.