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Pittsburgh, PA

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2018

Project Category: Public art installations

Description: To bring vibrancy to Pittsburgh's Beechview neighborhood, the Southwestern Pennsylvania Partnership for Aging engaged residents in a public art project. The result was Color Beechview. With the guidance of a local artist, community members wore LED lights on bodies, which they used to create light paintings through long-exposure technology. The resulting digital art depicts the silhouettes of Beechview residents, including children and older adults. SWPPA then displayed the art throughout the neighborhood, including on the sidewalk pavement in front of the senior center, on the side of light rail cars and along neighborhood fences. Organizers say key goals of the project were combatting social isolation and creating intergenerational connections. We encouraged people who didn't know one another to reach across generations and across ethnicities to connect, Lively Pittsburgh's Ted Cmarada said.

Houston, TX

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021

Project Category: Public art installations

Description: Organizers with the North Houston Management District noticed many of Houston's murals found in the city's more affluent neighborhoods. To bring quality public art to the Aldine neighborhood and draw visitors to the local library, the District painted an augmented reality mural. The artwork depicts the word knowledge on a colorful backdrop. Passersby can use a smartphone app to scan the mural, allowing them to experience additional multimedia content. The mural is the first augmented reality project of its kind in Houston. Project organizers say the creative placemaking effort is meant to build neighborhood pride and a positive local identity to lower-income, predominantly Black and Latino North Houston.

Washington, DC

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2024

Project Category: Public art installations

Description: To advance positive images of aging, this temporary public art initiative will create posters featuring photographs of older adult residents and their caregivers. The images will then display at an assisted living community during a citywide art festival.

Nearby AARP Community Challenge Projects

Crossville, TN

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2022

Project Category: Park enhancements

Description: This project transformed an Obed River Park shelter into an outdoor classroom. Among other uses, Cumberland County Soil Conservation District held classes there on plant and pollinator identification and monarch butterfly gardening.

Athens, TN

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2019

Project Category: Lifelong housing and accessibility

Description: Habitat for Humanity of McMinn hoped to provide housing and other resources to a local family of older adults living in substandard conditions. Like other Habitat chapters across the U.S., the organization builds homes for people in need of housing. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the organization completed the frame for a new home, reconvening to complete it once shut-down orders lifted. Habitat also provided training on the need for safe housing options, especially as homeowners choose to downsize as they age.

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