Kenturah Davis, a Los Angeles- and Accra-based artist known for large-scale drawings and carbon pencil rubbings that incorporate text, lost her Altadena home and studio in the Eaton fire last year. In response, she helped organize “Ode to ‘Dena,” a group show at the California African American Museum honoring the neighborhood, and is now launching Rest Stops, a restorative public art project and community garden aiming to establish 10 green spaces by 2027. She has also taken up pottery classes and rebuilt her studio practice in a new Altadena sanctuary.
This story matters because it highlights how artists are responding to climate-related disasters with community-driven, restorative projects that blend art, placemaking, and environmental healing. Davis’s work—which already engages with themes of body, text, and site—takes on new urgency as she transforms personal loss into collective resilience, demonstrating the role of artists in rebuilding neighborhoods and reimagining public space after catastrophe.