The benefits of public art are plentiful: inspiration, engagement, revitalization, economic development, beauty. Public art has all too often been directly associated with the displacement of families and individuals when used as an economic development tool in historically low-income communities without proper protections in place against displacement. With a well-thought-out anti-displacement strategy in place, public art can be transformative for historically low-income neighborhoods everywhere.

The Punto Urban Art Museum (PUAM), a public art initiative founded by North Shore Community Development Corporation (NSCDC) in Salem, Massachusetts, is addressing this head on as we enter a third year of programming.

NSCDC has been based in the Point neighborhood in Salem for 40 years, founded as a community organizing initiative in a neighborhood that was and remains a predominantly low-income, majority-minority community adjacent to downtown Salem, a thriving small city just 13 miles north of Boston along Massachusetts’ North Shore. Always an immigrant community, residents of the Point have experienced deep stigma and social isolation for generations. The same was true when the neighborhood was largely home to Franco-American immigrants from Quebec as it is today as a Dominican and Caribbean enclave.

Read the full article about public art and equity by Mickey Northcutt at ARTS Blog.