West Englewood's Youth Are the Real Superheroes: A New Mural Transforms the Joyce Mpower House Into a Neighborhood Landmark
By Socialhood News · West Englewood ·
A towering new mural on the side of a West Englewood digital arts training center is turning heads on South Honore Street — and sending a bold message to every young person who walks through its doors: you are the hero of your own story.
The mural, completed by Chicago artist Joe "Cujo" Nelson, now covers the massive side wall of the Joyce Mpower House at 6410 S. Honore St. The two-story work is spray-painted entirely by hand and depicts a Chicago skyline as its backdrop — with the students of the facility cast as the real superheroes rising from it. It debuted publicly on October 2, 2026, when the Chicago Sun-Times spotlighted the project, and it has since become one of the most talked-about pieces of public art to land on the South Side this fall.
The commission grew out of a conversation between Nelson and Carrie Pullie, executive director of Metropolitan Family Services, the organization that operates the Joyce Mpower House as part of its network of South Side facilities. Pullie wanted the mural to make young people feel genuinely welcomed the moment they arrived. "We wanted the youth to feel welcomed, and somehow we got on superheroes," she said, describing the finished work as a "comic book theme" that "perfectly captured what we wanted to see."
Nelson, who works under the name "Cujo," brought his own vision to the brief. "It's really all about young superheroes and their origin story," he said of the mural. "A lot of new artists and creatives are going to find this incubator and turn into our next big whoever in Chicago." The fact that he executed the entire piece with spray paint — no brushwork, no digital projection — makes the scale of the finished wall all the more striking.
The building it adorns is no ordinary community center. The Joyce Mpower House is a digital arts training facility purpose-built for South Side youth, housing a recording and podcast studio, a gaming and computer lab, and hands-on opportunities to learn graphic design and prototyping. For a neighborhood like West Englewood — where investment in creative infrastructure for young people has historically lagged — the facility represents exactly the kind of resource residents have long argued the community deserves. The mural is designed to signal that identity from the street, before a young person ever steps inside.
The timing of the mural's unveiling fits into a broader season of visible investment in West Englewood. Earlier this year, in April, officials broke ground on a $22.5 million, 44-unit affordable housing development at 6301 S. Western Ave., developed by the Southwest Side Organizing Project and Brinshore Development, with local firm Toro Construction serving as general contractor. That project — which will include 2,500 square feet of commercial space, a fitness room, and a community room — is expected to open by 2027 at the corner of 63rd and Western, an intersection Ald. Stephanie Coleman (16th Ward) has called "the entryway to both these neighborhoods." "We need the investment right here in a community that has not seen major development in 20-plus years," Coleman said at the April groundbreaking.
Taken together, the mural at Joyce Mpower House and the construction activity along the 63rd corridor speak to a neighborhood that is actively authoring its own future — through arts, through housing, through the patient work of institutions that have stayed rooted here for years. The superhero mural on Honore Street is, in that sense, more than paint on a wall. It is a declaration about who West Englewood's young people already are, and what this community expects of itself.
The Joyce Mpower House at 6410 S. Honore St. is open to South Side youth looking to explore digital arts, recording, podcasting, and design. To learn more about Metropolitan Family Services and the programs available at the Joyce Mpower House, visit metrofamily.org. If you live in or near West Englewood, take a walk past the mural — and bring a neighbor.
Sources:
1. https://chicago.suntimes.com/murals/2026/10/02/chicago-murals-cujo-nelson-jovonna-jackson-englewood-joyce-mpower-house
2. https://blockclubchicago.org/englewood-chatham-auburn-gresham/
3. https://blockclubchicago.org/2026/04/14/44-unit-affordable-housing-development-to-open-in-west-englewood-by-2027/