Mural Arts presents Emilio Martínez Poppe’s Civic Views

The featured employees emphasize the importance of the public sector, discuss the work they perform, its effect on the city, and how those closest to them perceive their careers.

“Before working here we never cared about the government or voting or anything,” another plaque declares. “We never felt like the government was telling us the truth or really there for us.”

“I have friends who will try and convince me to move out of the city and into the suburbs,” another plaque proclaims. “And morally, I’m against that. I’m not just talking about Philadelphia. I’m a pro city person. I believe that density works and that it is good for people.”

“I understand people who want government to work in their best interest, but they have to realize that we govern for everybody,” another plaque says. “So if you fix one problem over here for one group, it can have an adverse effect on another group of people.”

An employee’s perspective

Attendees of Martínez Poppe’s installation get to literally see these workers’ perspectives by taking a look out their office windows. Next to plaques featuring quotes from many of these workers are simple photos casting the viewer as that particular municipal employee. Suddenly, you’re the one gazing out that skinny office window, looking out onto the city’s ever-continuing gentrification, or out on one of Philadelphia’s luscious green parks, or one of the city’s busy streets, littered with cars.

“It’s all changing,” another plaque says. “Some neighborhoods you wouldn’t even think about going into when I was younger have $500,000 houses in them now.”

In one image, viewers are greeted with pamphlets of every color, discussing resources available for learning, healing, and staying cool in the City of Brotherly Love.

Casting the viewer in the role of the employee is Martínez Poppe’s intention, after two years spent photographing and interviewing city staffers across civic agencies. Each of these photographs has been reproduced at a 1-to-1 scale and, according to organizers, hung to specifications that match the experience of looking out each window.

These photographs and the plaques are mounted on a series of scaffolding armatures, which create an abstract map of the city, and somewhat mirror the gridlike layout that William Penn originally created. This scaffolding is no doubt a nod to Philly’s constantly changing urban landscape.

Championing the people who keep our city running

What I found the most striking element of Civic Views, however, was the installation’s May 23 opening event. The City Hall Courtyard was filled with Philadelphians of all stripes, many of whom gathered to hear the city’s Municipal Employees Choral Ensemble sing hits like Dolly Parton’s “9 to 5” and eat Puerto Rican-style delicacies from Fishtown’s Amy’s Pastelillos.

Civic Views features a variety of public events; head to the project’s Mural Arts page to find the schedule. After the City Hall Courtyard installation finishes, the project will head to a long-term home in the concourse of the Municipal Services Building thanks to a partnership with the Department of Public Property, and a book including essays and a full index of Martínez Poppe’s photos is in the works.

In a time when the public sector and its workers are facing increased hostility and privatization, Mural Arts says Civic Views “champions the people, buildings, and ethics that keep city government running.” The project shows that city government in particular is not a monolith. It’s a system made up of individual people, trying their hardest every day to make Philadelphia operate a little bit better tomorrow. People working to help other people: isn’t that what government is supposed to be all about?