Philly artists get out the vote with To the Polls 2024, now on view in Love Park

“Art makes you feel things,” Benner said when I met him at Love Park in late September, as this year’s artists were beginning their murals. “If you’ve ever danced to a song or cried to a ballad or laughed at a movie or, like me, walked around Philadelphia and had a work of art, of street art, or a mural, stop you in your tracks and make you think something or feel something or just make [you] more curious, that’s what art can do. Art is a really powerful tool.”

This is the fourth round of To the Polls, which launched in 2018 thanks to a concept Benner pitched to Mural Arts executive director Jane Golden. The project moved to Love Park in 2020, where it has been every two years since. While the format of this mural project has stayed the same (six highly Instagrammable 8x12-foot murals), “what really grows is the ideas the artists have,” Benner said.

An act of hope

This year, Philly painter and “mompreneur” MsPassionArt (Serena Saunders) created Rise Up, which rejects oppression and honors our responsibility to “rise up and take hold of the next and the new … we did it before, and we will do it again.”

“Serena feels deeply hopeful right now, and her mural is reflecting that hope that she feels and the fact that voting in and of itself is an act of hope,” Benner said. “If you are voting, you are wishing for the future, you are hoping for the future.”

Philly Will Decide

Prolific illustrator Hawk Krall’s Philly Will Decide “captures the spirit of the Philadelphia streets” in 2020 (when crowds danced at City Hall and at the Convention Center while the votes were tallied) and today. Krall evokes positive images (can you spot Philly Elmo?) that he hopes will fight the “combative, dark tone of modern politics” and motivate people to vote in 2024.

“I’m painting William Penn and it’s right there. I better draw it right because I have no excuse,” Krall told me as he worked on his mural in full view of City Hall. He said that many passersby were already excited by his mural, even in its earliest stages (one guy even broke into song).

Art transcends

Self-taught Philly native Alloyius Mcilwaine (founder of Cultures Clothing Company) created his spray-paint mural, Liberty and Democracy, to point out that many Americans have “fought and bled and died” for their right to vote. He thinks we should honor them by getting out to vote today.

“The thing that’s so important about art that I really learned in my travels is that it transcends,” he told me. “You can create a symbol with art that transcends speech, transcends ideas, transcends partisanship … [art is] its own language.” Look for the positive imagery of his signature kudoglyphs.

Deciding to vote

Interdisciplinary artist Isabella Akhtarshenas, who created her first mural in 2021, offers Vote? Vote! to illustrate “the journey from doubt to conviction.” According to her artist statement, her piece combines American flag imagery with a watermelon (a longtime symbol of Palestinian resistance) to “represent the intersection of personal convictions and national identity.” Her mural acknowledges an imperfect system while urging us to continue “showing up, speaking out, and voting with intention and purpose.”

Each year, Benner says, he wants to include an artist who struggles with whether or not to vote. “Her mural dives into that struggle that she’s had and where she’s landed with the fact that she will be voting. Because I think that’s an important message for people.”

The power of art (and voting)

Crochet installation artist Lace In The Moon (Nicole Nikolich) designed A Drag Queen Goes To Vote And It Is No Big Deal, featuring a gowned figure in platform stilettos at a voting booth. Nikolich tried to find a reference image for her concept of a drag queen voting and could not find a single photo. So she created this piece. “That’s how she is going to emphasize and underscore where the LGBTQ community is in this election,” Benner added.

The sixth artist, Cuttink Studio (Jeffy Thomas), who hails from Bahrain and India, is not able to vote in the US. “There is immense power in a vote,” he says in his muralist statement. “Children and immigrants are two groups that have no say in decisions that deeply affect their lives.” Voters guide not only their own destinies, but those of millions of others.

“I care so deeply about this project and the work the artists are putting into it,” Benner said. To The Polls 2024 will be on view for free in Love Park through Election Day, November 5, 2024.