Water Writes is a series of 10 collaborative mural projects in 10 cities across the globe.
“Ola ka Wai, Ola ka Honua” Water Writes Honolulu, HI 2011
The theme of water connects the participating communities and documents the current local and international water crisis.
Through our collective creative process, we engage youth, artists, organizers, and environmental activists to create imagery which reflects the relationship between the people and the water of each area. Community members are invited to a public paint day and able to participate in bringing these ideas into reality. The final murals are accessible to view by the public and also to communities across the world through video documentation and the Internet. We hope to spark discussions and cross collaboration between the participating cities and water warriors across the world.
2011 WATER WRITES Series
- Los Angeles, California – KIPP LA Prep Middle School in Boyle Heights
- Oakland, California – Broadway @ 21st Street in Downtown
- Honolulu, Hawaii – Kalihi Community
- Gaza Strip, Palestine – Middle Eastern Children’s Alliance Water Filtration Centers
- Palawan, Philippines – Palawan University
2012 WATER WRITES Series
- Arizona – Along the Little Colorado River Basin, where Senators McCain and Kyl (R-AZ) are proposing Senate Bill 2109 to amend the Water Writes guaranteed to the Hopi and Navajo Nations.
- Mexico City- With members of the Huichol communities whose traditional territory hosts the site of an annual pilgrimage to a sacred spring to gather peyote medicine. The community is under application by a Canadian mining corporation and is fighting to protect their land and water source.
- Vancouver, BC – Along the proposed route of the Enbridge pipeline, communities across Canada and the U.S. are facing massive pipeline projects through their lands and across their waterways as the Alberta Tar Sands are mined for bitumen to be refined into oil.
- Bogota, Colombia- At the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in tribute to a student who was leading anti-mining activism and has since been disappeared.
- Arcata, California – Along the Klamath River where the largest dam removal project ever is in motion after an advocacy campaign lead by local native tribes and environmentalists.
Through this process of painting with some of the communities most impacted by water rights issues, the Estria Foundation hopes to utilize our artistic techniques to assist ongoing grassroots struggles, create a global platform to raise awareness and inspire a movement.
