Americans for the Arts presents the 2010 Public Art Network (PAN) Award to community arts activist Judy Baca. This award acknowledges original and inspired involvement in the field of public art. In 1974 Baca founded the first city of Los Angeles mural program, and then two years later started SPARC: Social & Public Art Resource Center in Los Angeles where she is still the founder and artistic director. She has worked with the community to create many large scale murals in the Los Angeles area, most notably The Great Wall of Los Angeles, a representation of interracial harmony that is nationally recognized and is a combined work of 400 inner-city youth, 40 ethnic historians, and hundreds of community residents.

Baca is also a full-time professor at UCLA, and is currently working on the Cesar Chavez Memorial at San Jose State University, the Robert F. Kennedy monument at the Old Ambassador Hotel site, the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial in San Diego, and a digital painted mural for the Richmond Arts Center.

She received her award at the Americans for the Arts Half-Century Summit. Visit the press room for more information.