Over a two week period during Spring 2018, teaching artist, Carlos Gacharna, engaged teenage residents at the Dane County Juvenile Reception Center in a mural design project. Carlos lead workshops on cultural pattern design, with a peer vote helping to choose the final designs to be used for the intake corridor murals. Over the course of the residency, teens and Bubbler crew painted the hallway and the inside of both temporary intake holding cells used by the JRC upon arriving to the facility.
After finishing the project and taking in the view from one of the two intake cells, both coated with some bright new murals, Carlos reflects with a simple statement, “I can’t fix the system, but I can do my part to make it a little more bearable...the least I can do is bring a little humanity to their experience.”
Thanks to Carlos & the detention administration, a new welcome awaits all future arrivals!