Generational Healing at The Hive Market
Updated: Aug 31
Refuge Art School is proud to announce the completion of Generational Healing, a new collaborative mural now installed at the Hive Public Market at 101 Paige Street in Lowell, led and designed by two of our amazing young and emerging artists and painted by Refuge students.
“Generational Healing” is a quilt inspired mural created by the Refuge Mural Crew and designed by students Keila Pinales and Nev Morin. It honors the family businesses and entrepreneurs of Hive Public Market. The mural involved 10 artists and took 289 hours across 6 days to create. Braiding is a means of preservation. It holds memory and tradition as much as it protects one’s hair. Similarly, quilting is used to pass down these same cultural traditions through accessible material. Lowell’s textile history is reflected through the various fabrics spanning different cultures within our city; threading Lowell’s industrial past into its creative present. This mural concentrates on the rituals of mending and kinship through nature. At the center, a mother braids medicinal herbs into her daughter's hair, a quiet act of care that weaves the generational knowledge of survival, recovery, and hope into the next generation. Around the mother, dandelions past their prime mark the threshold between youth and maturity, between what we inherit and what we become. This visual transition speaks to the cyclical nature of healing: what the mother’s generation has weathered, the child transforms into new possibilities. Native plants throughout the mural’s composition ground the piece in nature's capacity for restoring life around us. The daughter looks ahead to a world of infinite potential as plants encompass her surroundings, visualizing that healing is not static but generative, growing more potent as it passes between hands, between hearts, between generations.
Designed by:
Keila Pinales
Nev Morin
Muralists:
Cloudy Rosas
Emma Burns
Keila Pinales
John Haiduk
Julia Jimenez-Grima
Maritza Lezama
Nev Morin
Supported in-part by the City of Lowell
The title, Generational Healing, reflects the mural's central message: that healing is not only personal, but collective. It happens through relationships, shared traditions, entrepreneurship, cultural pride, and the spaces we create together. As the Hive Public Market continues to support local businesses, many of them immigrant-owned; the mural serves as a visual tribute to the determination and creativity that define Lowell.
Projects like this are an essential part of Refuge Art School's mission.
Our public art program provides young artists with opportunities to work collaboratively, engage with community partners, and gain real-world experience designing and installing large-scale murals. Students develop technical skills while learning how public art can strengthen neighborhoods, tell community stories, and create a sense of belonging. We are grateful to the Hive Public Market for partnering with our students and providing a space where art and community can come together. Collaborations like this allow emerging artists to leave a lasting mark on the city while celebrating the people and stories that make Lowell unique.
If you're in the area, we invite you to stop by 101 Paige Street to experience Generational Healing in person, support the incredible vendors inside the Hive Public Market, and celebrate the creativity and resilience that continue to shape our community.
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