Project Brief

After Dark: Breaking the Chains of Human Trafficking

Project Brief:

Human trafficking is a real concern for our city and the central valley. ArtVenture is undertaking a broad, multi-modality project to help tell the story of human trafficking in the Fresno community. For the visual arts, the project involves several aspects. Students are working on a sub project, Parkway Drive, which features several motel properties along highway 99 where human trafficking takes place. Groups of students are collaborating on large paintings of select properties done in a graphic novel style. Students have collected stories about each property. These stories are fictional but based on fact and are included in the paintings.

Other students are painting scenes of Fresno taken at night. This part of the project is called Fresno After Dark. They are large oil paintings exploring the colors of the night in downtown Fresno. ELA students are writing stories about each of these paintings. Other visual art students are working on life-size, realistically painted figures of victims of human trafficking, both sex and labor trafficking, in a guerrilla street art project. Once completed, these “Pop Ups” will be installed in various Fresno downtown locations. ArtVenture is working hand in hand with the City of Fresno and their human trafficking initiative to create awareness of this issue. Each student artist wrote a specific story unique to their pop up, which is located on our website, artventureacademy.com via a QR code placed on the artwork. Every two or three weeks several pop ups will be installed around Fresno, leading up to our culminating exhibit on May 2 at the M Street Art Complex during ArtHop. Students are reading the book, Sold, by Patricia McCormick about a young girl in Nepal who was sold into prostitution by her step father. Students are creating artwork in their sketchbooks from various selections in the book. Backdrops and props are also being created for performance art, spoken word and dance, from the Sold book, as well as other literature sources.