Mart Community Project

The Mart Community Project (MCP) is a multifaceted, collaborative initiative designed to inspire individual and community transformation, promote economic revitalization, and encourage educational innovation in the town of Mart, Texas. Generously funded by the Mildred Dulaney Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, this experimental project is driven by a unique collaboration between the residents of Mart, Mart ISD, local and international artists, the Baylor University Oral History Institute, and multiple departments and schools at the University of Texas at Austin.

In 2008, Paula Gerstenblatt, a member of a Mart family by marriage, facilitated the construction of an art installation on her family’s land. The installation on the Davis family land became the catalyst for several oral history and community building programs in Mart. These projects include (Re)Building Memory: The Mart Black History Project, (Re)Building Memory: The Chambless Field History Project, and The Oral History Teacher Training Project. These ventures engendered MCP.