Shakespeare Steps 2024

Community Identity

In 2023, CITYarts collaborated with local youth and artists Yorknam Lam, Chloe Huang, and Natalie Caro to transform the Joker Stairs with a new staircase mural that reflects community identity in the Bronx, the Shakespeare Stairs.

NYC youth has breathed new life into the 132 steps that connect Anderson Ave. and Shakespeare Ave. in the Highbridge neighborhood of the Bronx by collaborating with CITYarts and professional artists on a staircase mural that has added vibrancy, joy, and a sense of community to its surroundings.

Throughout the summer of 2023, artists Yorknam Lam, Chloe Huang, and Natalie Caro worked with CITYarts’ SYEP interns to paint a staircase mural to transform the iconic step street, which became a tourist attraction after its appearance in a popular movie.

The mural is based on the ideas and visualizations of youth from local schools and community centers in the Bronx, including Fordham High School for the Arts, PS 011, PS 114x, Highbridge Green School, BronxWorks, Children's Arts & Sciences Workshop, and Children's Aid, who participated in CITYarts workshops in the winter. As part of CITYarts' Community Identity program, the new mural represents the unique identity and culture of the Bronx, capturing the love of music, native flowers, and a large-scale depiction of the Avenue’s iconic namesake, William Shakespeare.

After the Shakespeare Stairs were featured in a 2019 blockbuster film, the Bronx staircase became a popular photo destination for film buffs and tourists from all around the world. Now, the staircase mural reflects the identity of the neighborhood at a global scale, helping visitors recognize and appreciate the rich culture of the Bronx.

By collaborating with local artists, businesses, and residents of the Bronx, as well as with District 16 City Council Member, Althea Stevens, CITYarts is fulfilling a promise to Bronx Borough President, Vanessa L. Gibson, who granted CITYarts the first seed money to jumpstart this project when she was a NYC council member in 2021. “I want to thank CITYarts for their work in including our youth and community in this project to add beauty and art to our step street on Shakespeare Avenue. By working with students in nearby schools and community centers, we are helping to revitalize this throughway while also highlighting the richness of our borough and its neighborhoods through the lenses of our youngest residents,” said Bronx Borough President Vanessa L. Gibson. "Our collaborative investment ensures that we are uplifting the young voices by incorporating their ideas in the legacy of the Bronx. The new mural on the Shakespeare steps truly represents the unique identity and rich culture of The Bronx, created by the very hands that will shape its future," said New York City Council Member Althea Stevens, 16th District in The Bronx. “With every CITYarts project, we are planting the seeds for much-needed creative young leadership,” said Tsipi Ben-Haim, Founder, Creative and Executive Director of CITYarts.

This project has brought members of the Bronx community together around the beautification of a common, public throughway that continues to contribute to the rich history of the area with a public art mural. The introduction of a new public art mural here has provided local youth with an outlet to ignite their imaginations and pride, uplifting them through a collaborative process that celebrates the diversity and unique cultural identity of the Bronx.

In Summer 2024, CITYarts collaborated with artists Fiona Agababian, Daryl Daniels, and Alice Mizrachi along with youth from the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP) to re-envision the Shakespeare Stairs.

Youth and volunteers worked under the guidance of artist Fiona Agababian to clean and repaint the stairs with an updated design. The stairs continue to be a point of pride for the Bronx community. One community member seeing CITYarts at work said, “The Bronx needs this love.”

Project Photos