Local youth complete ‘Resilience’ mural at Yamaguchi Park

Posted

2021/06/image3.jpg
Photo courtesy Rise Above Violence, Rise Above Colorado
Local youth in Rise Above Violence’s Youth Rise program work with Rise Above Colorado Director of Youth Engagement Jonathan Judge to complete a mural at Yamaguchi Park last week. The mural is one of five being painted in southwest Colorado.

By John Finefrock
Rise Above Violence

Local youth in Rise Above Violence’s Youth Rise program have completed a mural at Yamaguchi Park.

In April, Rise Above Colorado, a statewide organization, secured funding in partnership with San Juan Basin Public Health to paint murals in five southwestern Colorado communities. Pagosa Springs is one of them.

Jonathan Judge, director of youth engagement for Rise Above Colorado, solicited design ideas via Zoom with Rise Above Violence’s Youth Rise students, who suggested that the downtown portion of the San Juan River would be the best scene for the mural, with the tagline “Resilient Pagosa” to illustrate the mural’s theme of “Resilience.”

Students said that community and the outdoors helped them cope during COVID. 

Last week, Judge traveled from Denver to Pagosa Springs and worked with Youth Rise students to complete the mural at Yamaguchi Park, which is on the shed in between the basketball courts and the baseball field, near the skate park.

A special thank you to our youth artists: Desi Martin, Jazmin Mendoza and Kyle Marotta, and to the Town of Pagosa Springs for providing the space for the mural. Free stickers of the mural will be available to the community next week by contacting ashley@riseaboveviolence.org.