Congratulations to Cara Michell, Assistant Professor of Architecture with a joint appointment in the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs, on being selected for the Boston Public Art Accelerator’s 8th Cohort! One of four artists selected, Cara will develop a temporary public art installation in one of Boston’s neighborhoods, set to debut sometime between March and October 2026.

The Boston Public Art Triennial’s Public Art Accelerator is a skill-building and grant-funding program that supports early-to-mid-career Boston-based artists in creating temporary public art projects in neighborhoods across the city.

Launched in 2018, the Accelerator has prepared more than 30 artists, providing over $1 million in direct funding to artists to bring their ideas to life in public — building a stronger, more equitable creative ecosystem for Boston. Through workshops, mentorship, and production support, artists gain the tools and confidence to create impactful, site-specific works that invite community connection. Over seven iterations of the program, artists’ projects have been collected by museums or permanently relocated, while alumni continue to teach in the field, earn numerous grants and accolades, and develop ambitious projects across the region.

The folks at Public Art Accelerator suggest keeping an eye on their social network site for progress on their public art journey and reading more about their work in The Journal.

Cara Michell is an artist, urbanist, and Assistant Professor of Race & Social Justice in the Built Environment at Northeastern University’s School of Architecture and School of Public Policy & Urban Affairs. Her research and creative practice focus on community-led cartography and decolonial approaches to participatory map-making. Before joining academia, Cara worked as an Associate and Senior Urban Planner at WXY Studio in NYC, and as an Urban Planner at Brook McIlroy in Toronto, managing projects that prioritized community voices in coastal resilience planning, transit-oriented development, and urban design. She was recently awarded a prestigious artist residency at the Cité Internationale des arts in Paris (2024-25) for her project “Black Psychogeographies: Transatlantic Community Mapping for a Diaspora.” Her artwork and participatory workshops have been featured at major cultural institutions, including MoMA PS1, the New Museum, La Mama Galleria, and Creative Time. She was selected for the New Museum’s NEW INC cultural incubator (2022-23) and has received fellowships from the Urban Design Forum and IdeasCity Detroit. In 2015, Cara co-founded and co-chaired the inaugural Black in Design conference at Harvard University with Courtney Sharpe and the Harvard GSD African American Student Union. Materials from this groundbreaking conference are now archived in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture. Cara holds a Master of Urban Planning from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and a Bachelor of Arts (magna cum laude) in Art & Archaeology from Princeton University, where she trained in studio art and sculpture.

For more about Cara’s work, click here.

Header Image: From Cara’s series of photographs entitled “Never Far From Home”