Artist Journey Allen. Visual Artist. Muralist. Cultural Practitioner. Healing-Centered Educator.
Artist Mission: To create art that restores, uplifts, and connects. Through muralism, storytelling, mentorship, and immersive creative practice, Journey Allen cultivates spaces where imagination becomes a pathway toward healing, reflection, empowerment, and community transformation.
Artist Vision: Journey Allen envisions creative spaces where people of all walks of life are invited to remember their humanity, honor their stories, and participate in shaping more compassionate and connected communities. Her work imagines a future where art functions not only as expression, but as ceremony, restoration, and collective liberation.
Select Mural Works
"Fresh Food is Liberation"
New Orleans East Business Complex, 2020
Completed with Living School New Orleans Art students and community members, this project was piloted in an effort to address the lack of fresh and healthy food options available to New Orleans East Residents.
"Innocent Until Proven Guilty: Our Mothers are not Inmates
Mural Installation Commissioned by Orleans Parish Prison Reform Coalition, 2021
In collaboration with Carpenter, Ross Harmon and Living School Art Students, this project was created to give voice to ending cash bail. It captures the true story of a mother who encountered an incident during Mardi Gras season that ultimately swallows her family into the cycle of recidivism as she is jailed. Unable to pay bail, she leaves her teenaged son and young daughter to fend for themselves.
"Colors of Our Culture"
New Orleans East Public Library, 2022
As the Lead Artist for the Young Artist Movement Program, Journey worked with youth artist to develop and execute the design for the New Orleans East Beautification Project led by Arts New Orleans and the New Orleans Business Alliance.
"Sacred Crowns:
The Crown Act Mural"
Commissioned by Dove, Joy Collective, and
Arts New Orleans, 2022
This mural celebrates "The Crown Act" which seeks to combat discrimination in the classroom and workplace in regards to hairstyles worn by Black women and men, boys and girls.
'Sacred Ones"
Juvenile Justice Intervention Center, 2024
Supported by the Platforms Fund, this intentional mural-making journey invited youth detained at the Juvenile Justice Intervention Center to explore mindfulness and sacred expression through art. Grounded in meditation practices inspired by peace activist Thich Nhat Hanh, and influenced by Kehinde Wiley’s Archeology of Silence, Jean Lacy’s stained glass, and Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam, participants transformed their chapel and community space with imagery reflecting their personal interpretations of the sacred.
"Light Bearers"
Commissioned for City of New Orleans, 2024
Light Bearers, a Mardi Gras-themed mural created by lead artist Journey Allen and 24 youth artists. "Light Bearers" pays homage to the Flambeaux Carriers, who were the first African Americans to participate in the mainstream New Orleans Mardi Gras celebration. Flambeaux participants consisted of both enslaved Africans and freed men of color who would earn tips tossed from the crowd as wages for their service of illuminating the path for nighttime parades by way of hand-held torches during the once segregated celebration.
"Guardian of the Garden: "
A collaborative Polytab mural project installed along the wall that borders the
Orleans Justice Center, 2025
Sponsored by Apple during Super Bowl LX 2026, Journey Allen led this project alongside The Artist Jade and Gabby Tolliver in collaboration with 20 teen artists of the Young Artist Movement. collaborative Polytab mural project was completed An elder gardener watches over two young boys in a vibrant garden where they are surrounded by imagery of black bodies in joy and embracing the state of "just being.". Juxtaposed with Orleans Justice Center (the adult incarceration facility), the mural urges its audience to choose nurture over neglect.
