SC Equity Collab, (SCEC), is a co-led initiative sparked by 2020’s energized racial justice movement and founded around the creation of Santa Cruz’s Black Lives Matter street mural—a project conceived by artist and activist Abi Mustapha.
In 2021, the mural was vandalized. Three years later, after court proceedings, and countless cries for retorative justice, the SCEC is coming together with the community once again to repaint the mural. Will you be there? Put your love into action on June 24th, 2023! Come anytime between 10-5pm or sign-up for a specific shift. Volunteers are needed! Fill out this form today!
SC EQUITY COLLAB
PURPOSE
Our mission is to bring awareness to the inequities in our community while bringing humanness to the process of becoming more equitable.
We strive toward these goals:
Highlighting leaders who are doing the work in our community
Providing tools for anyone desiring to re-examine their own racial equity standards in practice and action
Creating a support system for change and change makers
Illustrate what it looks like for organizations to go through racial equity training in a transparent, safe, and vulnerable way, so that others will be inspired to initiate change within themselves and their businesses or organizations.
While acknowledging the urgency of this need, we also remain aware that real change takes perseverance, humility, and time. We are committed to re-evaluating and shifting as much as needed to build the best practices and models for creating change in our community.
PROJECTS
On September 12, 2020, over 500 people came together to help create this artwork on Center Street, in Downtown Santa Cruz, in front of City Hall. This declaration that will live on until it is alive and true on every street across this country.
From the artists:
The value with this project is that this mural is only symbolic of the accountability initiative our city has committed to by permitting this project and approving along with it, equity, and accountability initiatives to drastically increase racial equity in Santa Cruz. We are currently in dialogue about how to properly do this and invite our community of color to the forefront.
WHO IS SC EQUITY COLLAB?
Abi Mustapha
Artist, Activist
Abi Mustapha is a Sierra Leonean-American artist. Her work is primarily focused on large scale portraiture and illustration inspired by examining the beauty of cross cultural diversity. Her art examines the complexity of expression and identity through the creative process. Graphite, charcoal, and oil paint on paper, are her preferred mediums.
Abi’s work has been exhibited in several galleries and museums in the Midwest and Bay Area including the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History, Garrett Museum of Art in Indiana, The Richmond Art Center, and Joyce Gordon Gallery. She was recently acquired into the permanent collection of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History, where she was also the museum’s 2020 Artist In Residence.
Born in Indiana, she is a graduate of Indiana University, earning a BA in Political Science with an emphasis in Sustainability. Outside of the studio, Abi is an avid traveler and dog mom.
Taylor Reinhold
Muralist, Mentor, Community Organizer
Born and raised in Santa Cruz, California, Taylor “Tay” Reinhold earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Santa Clara University. When returned home to Santa Cruz, his art began to blossom. In 2009, Reinhold founded Made Fresh Crew, a collective of artisans ranging in talents from pottery, glass blowing, videography, painting, and jewelry making.
Taylor avidly promotes creativity with youth through community outreach projects, leading and supporting workshops in multiple non-profit organizations including Youth NOW, Mariposa Arts, and the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History.
In 2011, he was granted a National Endowment of the Arts Award to co-curate the first Urban Arts Festival in Watsonville, California, an event aimed to educate youth about sustainable art, public murals, and street art. Since then he has partnered with The Newman Foundation, Tim Brauch Foundation, and Clean Oceans International to fund some of the largest murals in Santa Cruz County.
Perpetually creating, Reinhold designs and produces original, handmade clothing and wearable art with fellow artists in the Made Fresh Crew collective. Reinhold have also worked diligently to create public art highlighting environmental stewardship, social justice, and inclusivity.
Reinhold’s murals can be seen across the globe in places like South America, Europe, Asia and Africa. He has an unrelenting passion for creating art and beautifying public space. Reinhold has found his calling in painting murals and continues to paint around the West Coast, contracted to create installations for Plantronics, Comcast, and LinkedIn.
Sean McGowan
Santa Cruz Arts Commissioner, Artist, Philanthropist
Sean McGowen entered the arts community at a young age, co-opted by the chair of a local art walk (his mother) into the role of assistant, coordinator, and general interventionist. He immediately fell in love with the work, and realized the opportunity to grow as an individual and artist. Eventually, he began to learn his talents in photography, painting, screen printing, and sculpture. When the struggling art and music community around him became too apparent, he started an artist collective specializing in event production and promotion which thrives to this day.
Years later his life led him to Santa Cruz, where he received a bachelors degrees in Economics and Art, and an MFA in Digital Arts and New Media. After classroom hours, he and a group of friends decided to give back to the community and started an Indian food pop-up which donated all it's proceeds to local charities.
Sean currently works for artist Jim Campbell as a production lead specializing in rapid prototyping and development of large-scale public art projects.
Sean joined the Santa Cruz Arts Commission with the express intention of giving back to the community which helped mold him into the artist and man he is today. He plans to do so by creating opportunities for artists and activists in this amazing place we call home.
If Sean had a superpower it would be the ability to de-escalate any situation and create honest discussion.
Shandara Gill, ASW
social worker, mindfulness teacher, non-profit founder
Since 2014, Shandara (known to her friends as Shanie) has donated her time to serve individuals experiencing incarceration, recovery, various mental health experiences, domestic violence and homelessness with the gift of yoga. What started as a vision of making the practice of yoga accessible to all grew to utilizing the practice as a vehicle for social transformation.
Shanie combines her passions for yoga and holistic wellness with restorative justice and is often invited to speak about pathways to wellness and justice at various panels and conferences. Most recently, she was invited to speak about the changing Child Welfare System in California at the Institute for Restorative Practices international conference, as well as with Santa Cruz County's Public Health Department on complementary alternative medicine. She was named 2019's Give Back Person of the Year by The NEXTies, is a Be The Difference Award recipient and, in 2021, was recognized with a Queer Youth Leadership Ally Award.