Making a Scene: Former Fargo artist making a splash in impoverished Asian communities

“During my time in Fargo, I was surrounded by people who were really passionate about empowering artists and community members,” she said. “I was just surrounded by phenomenal people doing amazing things.”

Spending time around such people, she said, helped create who she is today.

“Fargo is a community where you just feel like you can do whatever you want to do,” she said. “That’s the situation I’m in now. I know that I can do what I want to do in Southeast Asia, and I’m just going for it.”

Mladnick grew up in Forest Lake, Minn., and graduated from Minnesota State University Moorhead in 2013 with an art and design degree.

She and St. Martin are now moving to Thailand to teach, and they started an Indiegogo fundraiser so they can build a series of climbing wall murals in impoverished communities there, too. They’re trying to raise $1,000 by Oct. 30, and as of last week, they were more than halfway to reaching their goal.

Q: What inspired you to move to Taiwan and paint murals?

A: I’ve always been a really passionate painter, but moreover, I’ve always been really passionate about community organization. When I graduated, I married a really great guy who’s into the same things as I am—community organization—who also does rock climbing, and I just decided to live my life a little bit more adventurously.

I saw an opportunity teaching in Taiwan. My husband and I booked flights, and we came, not sure if we were going to be here a year or maybe a three-month vacation. It ended up working out really well.

We’ve been able to paint and build mural climbing walls here several different times in impoverished communities for kids who don’t have access to play equipment. It’s been a great experience.

Why is it important to have the climbing walls?

Public art is great for any community. It enriches a community. It beautifies it.

Adding a climbing wall to a mural makes it more dynamic. Not only are children able to interact with it, but climbing is really beneficial for emotional development and cognitive skills. Children learn confidence, goal-setting. They learn how to visualize, because to be successful on a bouldering wall, you have to be able to piece together the climbing wall like it’s a puzzle.

Climbing walls are really great for communities and children who don’t have a lot of money for play equipment.

Once we install a climbing wall, it is there and it’s not going anywhere. It’s a permanent structure, and anybody can use it. You can do it without having a single cent to your name. That’s really important to us because it is truly an empowering activity.

How does it feel to see people using the walls?

I love seeing people interact with art. I love seeing people do more than just stare at a canvas on a wall. I love seeing them talk about art and feel art and walk around it and really experience it. This is like a sculpture piece for me, and it’s great to see communities coming together, engaging with each other. It creates a dialogue that wasn’t there.

Why did you decide to move to Thailand?

We’ve been in Taiwan for two years. I’m 25, and I think I’d like to move on and explore more corners of the world. Thailand, what’s more to want? They have amazing beaches. There are elephants, monkeys and rock climbing. There are also really great opportunities for us to teach there.

Our greater mission, if this (fundraising) campaign is successful, we would really like to do this in more communities.

After the funding is concluded in October is when it all begins for us. We can start planning our walls. We’re going to be posting regular photos, updates, pictures of community members. Everything every step of the way is going to be very well-documented so that people can see what they’ve contributed to.

How to help

Donations to help Anna Beth Mladnick and Mathew St. Martin build climbing wall murals in impoverished communities in Thailand can be made by Oct. 30 at tinyurl.com/p3czlrv.

Article published in InForum.