Using art for good!

[Rotting_Heart]

 Hello people! I've been wondering if other people use their art for good?

"whatzat mean?" you may be asking, well I mean community service work/mutual aid! (Among other things)


For example, I grabbed an empty filing cabinet, refurnished it, and now it's sitting in my local library to be used as one of them "little libraries" but for art!

I've also made an original character(s), made stickers with advice on them, and spread them around my town to cheer people up! There's more to this project of mine, but I want to keep the focus off of me and onto you! 

                                 V said sticker OC V


 Don't have anything to share? Just give me some ideas to help out my community then     


This is my first forum post like ever so forgive me if the formatting is off or it comes off as weird idk what I'm doing here 

[infernal.serval]

I'd really like to do something like this and have thought about it, but I generally don't have ideas when I sit down to draw.

Also, since ordering custom stickers is expensive, if you live in the US and ever don't want to do that you can get hundreds of USPS stickers mailed to your house for free. I didn't even have to pay shipping.

[Squidiottt]

oh thats so cool! i dont really do anything like that myself but it reminds me a bit of this website, they also make stickers and put them in places, unfortunately they havent updated anything in awhile though

[Rotting_Heart]

I'd really like to do something like this and have thought about it, but I generally don't have ideas when I sit down to draw.

Also, since ordering custom stickers is expensive, if you live in the US and ever don't want to do that you can get hundreds of USPS stickers mailed to your house for free. I didn't even have to pay shipping.

Thank you for the reply, I just shipped a bunch to my house! I'm hoping they'll last longer (the "stickers" I've made are just printed on paper, so eventually the printer ink will run in the rain and they become illegible..) So hopefully they'll hold up, maybe I can also put some sealant on them? Dunno but thanks :D

[infernal.serval]

Thank you for the reply, I just shipped a bunch to my house!

I'm glad I was able to help. They're just paper stickers so I think longevity will depend on that and what ink you use, and where you place them. Optionally, you could put clear packing tape over them to make them last longer.

When you go to make your art, what kinds of things do you think about to get ideas? My approach to ...guerilla art... so far has mostly been tagging in out-of-the-way areas only other artists visit.

[Rotting_Heart]

I'm glad I was able to help.

I do graphic design a lot, so I tend to get a lot of ideas off of Pinterest! Seeing a bunch of images and text mesh together can get my imagination running free, so it helps a lot. I also save images of art I like in there, and it will recommend me more. Infinite idea generator!

There's lots of ways to go about searching for ideas though, you could literally just look up "Ways to help community" or "craftivism".

In fact you don't even gotta do that, I just walked into my library and asked if I could set out pins for people to take and they said yes! So I'm sure you could do something like that with other objects/art. 

For placement of stickers, I place them in areas where people are able to read them easily like parks and whatnot. My town really likes what I do so I don't have much fear of being arrested for vandalism.




Random community service idea: Taking one of them gumball machines, but filling it art, affirmations, compliments, etc and putting it in a public space to make people feel better/inspired

[kringle]

In fact you don't even gotta do that, I just walked into my library and asked if I could set out pins for people to take and they said yes! So I'm sure you could do something like that with other objects/art. 

For placement of stickers, I place them in areas where people are able to read them easily like parks and whatnot. My town really likes what I do so I don't have much fear of being arrested for vandalism.

waaaa thats so cool, i live in an area that isn't super vibrant when it comes to the local arts community so i'm not sure how it'd be taken if i put up posters, but i never thought of just asking my local library if i could leave something there for people! thats a really good idea, i'll try to do something like that this month

[PALEOKNIGHT]

Still haven’t put this idea into practice yet, but I plan on making charity adoptables.
I want to design characters after Brazilian fauna, and then donate part of the money I earn to reforestation projects!
I want to design lesser know critters, or at least ones that I don’t often see as ocs. Things like monkeys, armadillos and kinkajous are already on my to do list.

[Tuffy!]

donate part of the money I earn to reforestation projects!

I love your idea!

That is exactly what I have on my mind as well with my upcoming company.

I want to donate a big chunk of all the money that comes in to nature conservation projects and help form a community of people that care for mother nature, a community that is globally connected and does community projects together to help preserve and restore habitats for animals and plants (and mushrooms)


Creating art for a greater good is 

 

[characterofyours]

   

I love this topic!! I've been talking about art for the public good for a long time!!! If an artist ever finds themself unmotivated, doing these projects can really re-ignite that kind of love for what makes art so special: connecting with others!!!!

I've done quite a few projects like this and I'm really happy to hear you doing it too! I was talking about your art swap idea with a friend and apparently our local Community Center just got its own art swap box! Which I will definitely be contributing to.

Stuff I've done which will hopefully inspire people to do their own cool projects    :

Tabling event: I got my friends together to make a little "publishing company" called Poplar Publishing. My sister sold her short stories in little booklets, I sold my mixtape, a yuri comic, and a Zine, and our other friends sold their photography. We did one event on my college campus, and one in my hometown, and we're definitely gonna do it again soon. It was so fun!
  And every purchase came free with a pack of native plant seeds! 
So I got to educate residents of my suburban hellscape about the importance of pollinators! 

Mural: I visited a Banksy museum and realized that I can just paint anywhere. Epic. The full story is elsewhere but TLDR my grandmother was diagnosed with cancer, and I started painting an Alice in Wonderland mural in the backyard to cheer everyone up, since the women of my family really like AiW. It worked really well! I would stay home and paint, and she would lay down nearby and relax. We'd play card games (fighting to let the other win), I'd give her medicine while my mom was at work, etc. ;-;


Trash Can: My sister and I discovered a couple miles of trail near our house, but it was Flooded with trash from nearby homes. I did a couple small cleanups, and I plan to do a few bigger ones when I move back with my sister. But, what I've already done is put a big trash can by the entrance with a message painted on it "LITTER AND DIE!!!  " on the back there's a little upside-down OK hand signal ehehe. The trash can itself has a cinder block inside from a nearby trash pile to keep it standing.

Potatoes: Whenever I get anxious about the state of things in the US, I plant potatoes so my family will have food. My college campus had a few of them, but apparently it's best to harvest them every year so they don't freeze and rot overwinter  Still, I'm learning more about plants now so that I can be a good guerilla gardener on day 

Public Photo Project: I went to a rlly dull university that discouraged student contribution and creativity. It squashed two separate native planting projects I was involved in, "losing the plants," at the last second. It wouldn't prioritize cool events in favor of sports events. High police presence. There was no campus culture, made worse by the fact that I attended school right after covid. SO I got angry and asked my friends to make a pillow fort with me in our empty library. We went up to the stacks with bags full of blankets, pillows, and books, and we took photos inside our little fort. I posted the photos online on Instagram and our school's Reddit page, and a lot of people responded to discuss how empty the school feels! Some people asked me to do it again but as it was finals season of my senior year, I didn't end up doing it again BUT I would like to do it in my hometown one day! The campaign is "Make Reading Bohemian Again!" bc I think the atmosphere of public libraries as Government Buildings (with all due respect) has made them uncool to kids. Hence, Pillow Forts. 

Stuff I want to do: Make a native seed library for my suburban neighborhood. The plan is to find a cool water-proof cabinet on facebook market place, splurge on seeds, and print out some associated brochures, and put it on the book swap map!

Mermaid mural: There's a perfect wall on the perfect beach to graffiti a mermaid sitting in a bathtub. I wanna do it so bad, and I'm just waiting to move back home.

I also want to start an Adult Writing Group for ages 20-30. Two nights a month for Writing Critique, a Presentation Night (anything you want for 5 minutes), a News Room (Political Presentations) mixed with a letter writing campaigning, some quiet writing hours, and an annual SLUMBER PARTYYY. That's my dream for the next year.


AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, I'm currently working on my first Neocities page called Quest Board! It's a page for creatives to post their cool real-world projects! Because I'm doing this kind of stuff constantly, I'm hoping to find other people who go out of their way to do cool stuff in the real world! And make friends!
(But I am new here, so it'll take me a while to learn the ropes.)

OK Sorry for the long post. I got excited when I saw your topic. Would love to connect and keep updated if you do more cool stuff!