Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective comprises professional artists and urban youth ages 16-24, working together to create social change. The Collective takes local stories, reframes and retells them through art, writing and performance to promote understanding, civic pride, intergenerational relationships and literacy. The goal is to promote a better educated, more peaceful and caring region through storytelling.
Story Stitchers is a resident organization at Kranzberg Arts Foundation in Grand Center Arts District and maintains The Center, a 4,450 sq ft safe space for creative youth development located at 3701 Grandel Sq, 63108. Projects create a platform for community engagement through an artistic lens and with it the Story Stitchers work to shift perceptions and realities.
Youth who are 16-25 years old and living in St. Louis region may apply to join Stitchers Youth Council. No experience is necessary and programs are provided free, without fee. Registration is required. Click the button and apply today!
Story Stitchers works to impact youth violence in the community through vocational training, peer to peer youth guidance, youth leadership, and through honest and high quality artistic work that can turn heads and help to bring about new ways of thinking about the roles black youth can play in our city and in American society.
Projects create a platform for community engagement through an artistic lens and with it the Saint Louis Story Stitchers work to shift perceptions and realities and bring hope to the Saint Louis community.
Story Stitchers projects often directly address gun violence and youth crime prevention. This is done through creative youth development and nonviolent collective action moving towards creating systemic change.
Direct link to the article: Ladue News
StL Public Radio: Story Stitchers artists promote healing from CVPA shooting
Programs (under the Programs tab on storystitchers.org) are multi-year and ongoing and include:
The StitchCast Studio project expands Story Stitchers’ current programs (which include vocational arts training and community-building) to add regular discussion-based education programming with artist-mentors and youth-led podcast recordings that incorporate the arts. StitchCast Studio podcasts will focus on the streets, gun violence, and finding solutions to issues that are coming at our youth hard. The voices of St. Louis youth are important to hear at this critical time.
Link to the article: St. Louis on the Air
Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective presents Peace in the Prairie, an original presentation exploring the concepts of peace and violence, juxtaposing urban life as experienced by African American people living in the city of St. Louis, Missouri and the state’s endangered prairie lands.
Is the path towards peace through Missouri’s native prairies?
Story Stitchers collected stories from residents and encouraging them to share what their community means to them as part of The WHY of MY City. Story Stitchers capture and document black history through written word and art by archiving oral history, story collection and storytelling. Audiences will gain insight into neighbors’ lives. The WHY of MY City seeks to collect positive stories of local heroes in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods that are struggling with decline.The WHY of MY City captures and documents pieces of black history through written word and art while training the next generation to become active, engaged citizens. Our goal is that programs become a force multiplier, rippling into families, schools, and neighborhoods, offering solutions to common urban problems.
Pick the City UP presents Saint Louis Story Stitchers unique brand of urban storytelling, featuring live original STL hip hop, spoken word and story magic on public health issues St. Louis cares about including gun violence. Pay tribute, join the fun, and make a difference. Bringing positive change to the Lou.
Saint Louis Story Stitchers is partnering with the Wellston Loop Community Development Corporation on a youth-driven collaborative project that uses the creation of a bus stop shelter and fence mural to drive public engagement and honest discourse on issues including gun violence, race, trauma, gangs, food insecurity, addiction, etc. Stitchers Youth leaders create programming for one of St. Louis’s challenged African American districts to foster a safe and supportive neighborhood.
Photo by Whitney Curtis/WUSTL Photos
Not Another One! includes youth-led discussions with civic leaders that are then published. Through powerful conversations youth explore their community through a new lens with a focus on proactive solutions to address racial, education and economic differences. This year 5 high school assembly performances were presented to youth from five high schools in St. Louis Public School District. All students in the audiences rode school buses to Central Visual and Performing Arts High School for the performances. Each performance was followed by a youth-led Q&A discussion with police and social service professionals.
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Saint Louis Story Stitchers is working collaboratively to create an evidence-based approach to youth gun violence prevention. Story Stitchers bring the arts and humanities to the forefront through a unique form of “urban storytelling,” attracting attention, building excitement, and communicating key concepts from public safety and health professionals to the target demographic.
The target demographic is African American youth, ages 16-24 years old, in the city of St. Louis.
Youth are concerned with gun violence in the city and have reported to Story Stitchers adults their strong interest in positive, safe activities, a desire to hear music with a good message, and a need for strong and stable mentorship. Youth report high incidence of difficult experiences including loss of family and/or friends due to gun violence, hunger, poverty, parental imprisonment, and lack of access to transportation, lack of working phones, disciplinary issues at school, low grades, or family obligations such as caring for younger siblings. Youth report a strong interest in friends, safe activities, the arts, leadership opportunities, and earning money.
Story Stitchers GUN VIOLENCE PREVENTION PROGRAM
Project leaders include Susan Colangelo, MFA, ‘83, president of the Stitchers with 30+ years of community arts experience and work with 5 school districts; Jamie K.P. Dennis, Stitchers artist in residence is lead musician and director of the Save Our Sons, Urban League of St. Louis, with over 25 years of professional music recording and performance experience and 10 years as a teaching artist.
For information and bookings email storystitchers@gmail.com.
The following are excerpts of work on gun violence prevention.
Saint Louis Story Stitchers held the 2016 youth-led videotaped discussion on gun violence called, It’s Not OK! on November 10th in Kranzberg Arts Center’s Black Box Theater. The program created a platform for a lively youth-led discussion with local community leaders to identify problems and solutions and to create an action plan for peace for youth and families affected by gun violence. Stitchers Teen Council Co-Chairs Aniya and Toryon led the discussion.
In this sequel to the 2015 discussion, Not Another One!, youth and adult guests re-opened communication to identify commonality, greater understanding and ways to cooperate and collaborate to heal America’s racial disparities. Teenagers, police and leaders searched for solutions to relevant topics including ways to curb youth gun crime, best practices for police-minority youth interaction, and the no snitching phenomenon.
Stitchers Teen Council’s Taron and Toryon aka T&T, star in the new music video for the song by Story Stitchers artist in residence Jarmel Reece, titled, It’s Not OK!, addressing for peers and younger kids the dangers of guns. The piece is the title song of the 2016 youth-led gun violence discussion on gun violence prevention.
This program was sponsored by the Regional Arts Commission, Kranzberg Arts Foundation, Kranzberg Arts Center, the Institute for Public Health’s Gun Violence Initiative at Washington University in St. Louis, the Steward Family Foundation, the Yvette and John Dubinsky Family Foundation, and Risa Zwerling and Mark S. Wrighton, Ph.D.
Blog about the 2016 discussion
This program may be quoted and/or shown in educational settings with permission via email at storystitchers@gmail.com. The program may not be reproduced for commercial use or edited in part or in whole without permission from the Saint Louis Story Stitchers.
NOT ANOTHER ONE!
N
OT ANOTHER ONE! A Play for Peace
February 25, 2017
.ZACK, 3224 Locust
Topics such as trauma, legal rights, and police shootings were explored in an open and respectful manner. Sponsored by Kranzberg Arts Foundation, Regional Arts Commission, Steward Family Foundation, Freedman Family Fund, Yvette and John Dubinsky Family Foundation, Susan Block at The Designing Block, Susie and Gordon Philpott, Alison and John Ferring, Mr. and Mrs. B.A. Bridgewater, and Susan Sauer at Rome West Realty LLC.
Buy the book HERE
Teen: How much of the gun violence problem is caused by teenagers?
Carl Filler from Mayor Slay’s Office:
“We don’t know exactly how much because we don’t always know who commits a crime in the city of St. Louis unfortunately, however a large number of crimes, almost half of them, are committed by individuals under the age of 25, not all of those are teenagers but we do know unfortunately that young people in the city of St. Louis do have access to guns and that is a significant problem.”
Lt. Col. Ronnie Robinson, Deputy Chief of Police, St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department:
“Criminal activity amongst teenagers in the city is at a very high rate and unfortunately they do have access to illegal weapons.
…Enforcement is not the answer to all our problems and incarceration is definitely not the answer. We need intervention and outreach along with enforcement in order to solve the ills that we are suffering from in our city of St. Louis relative to violent crime involving teens.”
The purpose of the videotaped discussion is to open communication and to identify commonality, greater understanding and ways to cooperate and collaborate between city police and teen age youth as both work to lower St. Louis’s high rates of gun violence.
The video is utilized by teachers, parents, researchers and exhibited in galleries and community centers to generate additional discussion. A transcription of the discussion will be published in book form by the Collective in 2016.
Police And Teens: Finding Ways To Work Together To Combat Gun Violence
With the discussion and other works of art, Story Stitchers commissioned playwright Lauron Thompson to create a script and direct the first version of the play, Not Another One! A Play For Peace!
The StitchCast Studio project expands Story Stitchers’ current programs (which include vocational arts training and community-building) to add regular discussion-based education programming with artist-mentors and youth-led podcast recordings that incorporate the arts. StitchCast Studio podcasts will focus on the streets, gun violence, and finding solutions to issues that are coming at our youth hard. The voices of St. Louis youth are important to hear at this critical time.
The results of evaluation activities for the 2020-21 program year provide evidence that Story Stitchers’ StitchCast Studio achieved a number of positive outcomes that help young people deal with stress and trauma and serve as protective factors against youth violence.
These outcomes include the following:
- Increased self-confidence and self-efficacy with high levels of improvement reported for 86% of youth by their mentors and self-reports of improvement from pre to post for 60% by youth. Self-confidence includes the ability to engage effectively in learning/using new skills and accomplishing goals during program activities.
- Improvements in self-awareness and self-expression with high levels of improvement reported for 76% of youth by mentors. These improvements include increases in youths’ abilities to engage in self-reflection and express themselves in both structured and creative ways.
- Improved problem-solving skills and perseverance as reported by mentors for 73% of youth, with the ability to move forward effectively in the face of challenges and contribute to creative solutions.
- Improved project management skills, reported for 67% of youth, including abilities to set goals, make progress, meet timeliness, and evaluate success. In addition, 38% of youth reported improvement in their time management skills.
- Improved leadership skills with high levels of improvement reported for 64% of youth by mentors. Leadership skills include the ability to share ideas effectively, move activities forward, and support/motivate peers.
- Improved technical skills as evidenced by youth comments on what they learned and reports of improvement from pre to post by 62% of youth.
- Enhanced creative thinking skills as reported for 57% of youth, including abilities to generate original ideas, innovative approaches, and creative content for podcasts and other activities.
Other protective factors strongly supported by StitchCast Studio include the following:
- Connections with others
- Coping skills, or youth abilities to handle stress
- Community/civic awareness and connectedness
- Collaboration/teamwork skills
StitchCast Studio activities and the supportive environment it offers are effective in providing youth from high-crime neighborhoods new opportunities that recognize their exceptional levels of creative talent and provide new platforms for reaching and serving their communities.
Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective presents Peace in the Prairie, an original presentation exploring the concepts of peace and violence, juxtaposing urban life as experienced by African American people living in the city of St. Louis, Missouri and the state’s endangered prairie lands.
Is the path towards peace through Missouri’s native prairies?
Story Stitchers started an exploration of native Missouri prairie lands with photo shoots and overnight trips to the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Shaw Nature Reserve in 2016 and again in 2017.
Peace in the Prairie supports the research, creation and public presentation of a completed conceptual work of art by artists exploring the juxtaposition of violence in St. Louis’s urban environment and the peacefulness of Missouri’s natural prairie landscapes.
The project expands the artistic body of work of African American artists in the Collective, addresses the community need of understanding violence while seeking peace, supports the exploration of new natural settings by both artists and audiences, and supports the greater understanding of Missouri’s unique natural heritage in its native prairie lands.
To learn more visit Peace in the Prairie: HERE
For high school or university screening of the full-length piece, please email storystitchers@gmail.com. Peace in the Prairie includes references to violece.
The public was invited to visit the Storefront Studio at 616 N Skinker Blvd. in the Loop District on Thursday, June 2, 2016 from 11:00a to 3:00p to mark National Gun Violence Awareness Day. Stitchers Teens tweeted out #wearorange portraits, visitors stepped into the audio recording booth and shared why they care about gun violence prevention. This program is presented in collaboration with Everytown for Gun Safety’s wearorange.org and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.
Free gun locks were provided by Women’s Voices Raised for Social Justice. Thank you!
Story Stitchers partnered with Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, St. Louis and Everytown for Gun Safety to draw attention to National Gun Violence Awareness day on June 2nd, 2015. This video shows Stitchers visit to a Moms Demand Action meeting and a photo shoot as Stitchers prepared for #wearorange on June 2nd.
On June 2nd, Stitchers and artist Buzz Spector created one of Buzz’s signature book installation. Buzz called it “Not One More”. Opening and community engagement took place as people visited and had their #wearorange portraits tweeted out to the world from the Stitchers Storefront Studio.
K.P. Dennis dedicated the song to Jacobi Taylor, his young nephew, who was lost to senseless gun violence at age 21 just this past summer.
The brilliant third verse of K.P.’s song, Gunshots!! describes in rap the 10 things we can all do to combat gun violence, as recommended by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce on her website: www.stlouisguncrime.com/
Secure ya legal weapon tell others to do the same!
Don’t carry nothing if it ain’t registered in your name!
Record the make, model, serial number information!
If it come up missing then you can find the location.
Call 911 whenever you hear some gunshots!
Tell the police if you witness a crime on your block!
If an organization improves life of the youth,
Donate or volunteer your time and give’em a boost!
Help a struggling parent…. Whose burdens weigh a ton!
Become a mentor “earn and learn” hire the young!
They say I am the one! I guess I’m on the list,
Clean up my neighborhood participate in ownership!…
Make it a model gotta look out for each other,
If we get to know our neighbors we could fix it like sisters and brothers!
I can’t trust ya. How can we ever begin?
To build peace! I keep, losing my friends when they…
Hangout… gunshots!
Stay inside… gunshots!
Non stop… gunshots!
Day light there’s gunshots!
Nighttime more gunshots!
Around the clock… the young drop!
Wave your hands high if you’re tired of hearing gunshots!
Copyright Saint Louis Story Stitchers, 2015
Story Stitchers artists and Teen Council members created Not Another One! as part of a focus on gun violence prevention.
Trevor, who is 16 years old, describes feelings of frustration and hope in his lyrics for the teens’ gun violence prevention song, Not Another ONE!
I don’t want people to know the Lou,
As a place where people shoot,
Or a place where people loot,
Or a place where cops are brutes!
Show Me State let’s show them then,
That disputes don’t have to end!
With a life that has to end.
These streets they can be cleansed.
It starts with just me and you,
With this power it can all be through.
This world sick it has the flu,
Let’s make a change starting with the Lou!
Copyright Saint Louis Story Stitchers, 2015
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