Imagine a warm sunny morning in Woodburn, Oregon where farmworker youth, community leaders, and community elders are assembling together around muralist Juanishi Orosco, a renowned Chicano muralist. Equipped with paint brushes, buckets of paint, rows of ladders, and their imagination, community members with the direction of Juanishi begin taking the first strokes of paint on a wall to create a mural that captures a segment of Woodburn’s history: the history of the farmworker.
Imagine the laughter, the intermingling of multiple generations, ethnic groups, and civic leaders as together they paint a mural that honors the indigenous community, the early Chinese and Latino farmworkers who worked in the fields, the farmworker movement led by PCUN, and recent events such as the 2012 election that reflects the power of the Latino vote.
Now that’s a beautiful image, if not a powerful image, that captures the historical narrative of the farmworker community. It is essentially the image the CAPACES Leadership Institute (CLI) is assembling to paint this summer. And we’ve been determined to make it happen.
We led the campaign that changed the city ordinance last August to allow for publicly displayed murals.
We’ve identified the canvass, the exterior walls of the newly constructed CAPACES Leadership Institute.
We’ve chosen our painter, muralist Juanishi Orosco, who with over forty years of experience has painted murals throughout the west coast, including the iconic mural in PCUN’s Risberg Hall.
We’ve submitted our mural application and expect approval from the Woodburn Public Art Mural Committee on Tuesday, June 26th.
Now we need your help to make that image real. Our goal is to fundraise $5,000 by July 13th, the second birthday of CAPACES Leadership Institute’s incorporation and the official kick-off to paint the mural. The cost of the mural project is $16,000. We’ve already raised $11,000.
The mural, is more than a painting, it’s a landmark, an open history book that tells a story that we are trying to share to the community and future generations. Please consider making a contribution to help us tell this story. To donate click HERE!
Thank you!
In gratitude,
Laura Isiordia
Executive Director