We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jeff Huntington a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jeff thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

In the summer of 2016, my wife and art partner, Julia Gibb, and I founded Future History Now, a nonprofit arts project creating collaborative murals with youth from underserved communities.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Julia Gibb and I met in art school in 1992. We attended the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, DC, where we began our collaborative journey creating pop-up art galleries throughout the city called Gallery 4 Now. After receiving our BFAs, I pursued an MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago before moving to New York City. Julia moved back to her hometown of Annapolis, Maryland where she lived on a boat, worked in landscaping, and taught yoga. We re-connected a couple months after 9/11, 2001, and were married shortly thereafter. In 2002, I joined Julia in Annapolis. In 2004, we rented a studio where we operated a screen-printing business for the next thirteen years. Since 2004 until the present, Julia has studied and taught traditional hula. I also worked as an adjunct professor at the Corcoran School of the Arts & Design and the George Washington University until 2016, when Julia and I started a non-profit arts project called Future History Now (FHN), creating murals with youth from underserved communities. Since 2016, we’ve created approximately 50 mural projects spanning 5 countries throughout the world.
As FHN began to receive more requests for projects, speaking engagements, and collaborations, our for-profit art business, Jahru Studio, also gained momentum. The demands of a heavy workload, along with the challenges of running a non-profit, have pushed us to evolve, ever seeking a balance between community-based mural projects, our personal artwork, and earning a living.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

It hasn’t been a smooth road as life tends to provide many twists and turns. In 2015, I created a mural for a local restaurant in Annapolis. The Historic Preservation Commission and political leaders took exception, and the city sued the businessman who commissioned the artwork. This lead the restaurant owner to run for Mayor on an art platform. And he won. A series of conflicts ensued, resulting in a strategic reboot, cultivating more productive relationships within our cultural ecosystem. This evolution gave rise to Future History Now.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

Julia and I want to continue to evolve everyday while maintaining a meaningful existence where we live as independent artists and as a nonprofit arts project.   

Contact Info:

• Website: futurehistorynow.org
• Instagram: @futurehistorynow.art
• Other: primary website: jahru.com primary instagram: @jahru

Image Credits
Images labeled FHN are courtesy of Future History Now, Inc. Images labeled Jahru Studio are courtesy of Jahru Studio, LLC