Podcast: Artist Meg Saligman, “The Power of Art to Inspire Community Dialogue”
Posted by: Roy Wilbur
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For the past 25 years, Meg Saligman has produced over 40 permanent public artworks worldwide, including some of the world’s largest public murals. Though she has produced works internationally, Saligman’s seminal murals in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania are considered a catalyst for the contemporary mural movement. Her practice stems from a deep desire to use public art to give a voice to those who have been marginalized. With a focus on community engagement, collaboration, and facilitating social exchange in pursuit of shared experience, Saligman consistently amplifies local culture in her designs. She seamlessly combines both the classical and the contemporary using paint, glass, and light to give new life to existing architecture. In addition to her iconic murals, Saligman takes on the same challenging subject matter in her temporary and architectural installations. Most recently, Saligman created public installations for Pope Francis’ visit to Philadelphia in 2015 and for the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in 2016. Additionally in 2015, Saligman and her team produced a 42,000+ square foot mural in Chattanooga, Tennessee that highlighted the city’s complex racial and cultural dynamics.
Saligman was named one of the most influential American muralists by Public Art Review and has been recognized by the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, NPR, the National Endowment for the Arts, Art in America, the Smithsonian Institute, and numerous others. She has received several awards, including the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program Visionary Artist Award. Saligman’s work resides in the permanent collections of both the Johnson and Johnson works on paper collection and Rutgers University Museum of Fine Arts print collection.