The Atlanta Super Bowl Host Committee and the City of Atlanta have united with arts and advocacy organization WonderRoot to launch a large-scale community initiative titled “Off The Wall.” The project will produce up to 30 public murals to capture the past, present, and future of Atlanta’s historic civil rights legacy and current social justice movements. The complete collection of works will become part of the City of Atlanta’s permanent public art collection.

“The Atlanta Super Bowl Host Committee is very proud to partner with WonderRoot to create ‘Off the Wall’ as part of our Legacy 53 mission,” said Brett Daniels, COO, Atlanta Super Bowl Host Committee. “Our aim is to embrace our city’s rich civil rights heritage as well as bring people together to celebrate the unique diversity of our city in a lasting way.”

The Atlanta Super Bowl Host Committee selected WonderRoot as its partner because it is a well-established organization that connects with civic groups to develop arts programs that respond to community needs and art works that are relevant to the entire city. The design of each “Off The Wall” mural will be developed through a series of direct, facilitated community conversations that artists will attend, using a facilitation guide authored by WonderRoot and Carlton Mackey, director of the Ethics and The Arts Program at Emory University Center for Ethics and Dr. Karchaik Sims-Alvarado, founder of Preserve Black Atlanta. Participating communities will take many different forms and expressions based on identity, geography, and affinity. They will be encouraged to share their life experiences and relationships to civil rights and social justice.

“We believe that art has the power to transcend boundaries and barriers of race, religion, gender, and many other forms of social difference,” said WonderRoot Executive Director Chris Appleton. “It has the ability to honor the past and activate a new future, bringing people together across lines of social difference to advance social change."

Currently, the murals are slated to be installed in two specific sectors, in the neighborhoods of Vine City, English Avenue, and Castleberry Hill that border Mercedes-Benz Stadium where the game will be played, and in the downtown district where tourists and Atlanta residents mix daily. Other locations will be announced.