The mural is called the Connections Mural, inspired by the Connections Gallery at Roosevelt High, and created in partnership with CNO, SENA, and Folwell. We want to make visible the connections between the school communities, the school, and the surrounding community. We also wanted to showcase the fabulous arts programming that makes Folwell a super unique school in the MPS system.

Images speak to how we are all strands in a great braid/community weaving, with those strands also representing waterways that connect us back to the land and Minnesota. There are images that flow through the different panels linking them together.

There are images that speak to migrations and transformation (butterflies and flying geese both based on kid drawings), marigolds that are culturally significant in Mexican culture and also grow everywhere here in the summer. There are also multiple references to ” home”, kids wearing their “home” on their heads and playing in their neighborhood (houses).

Throughout the whole work I wanted to make reference to that childlike innocence and openness that kids so easily exhibit that we often loose as we get older; the ability to connect and play together overcoming language/cultural/class/etc. differences. Since this is the “Connections” mural, I wanted to seed that idea throughout the whole work, with the hope that it can grow as a quality both within the school and in its surrounding community.