The ARTS at Marks Garage’s free teen art programs aren’t just about the mechanics of creating art. They’re designed to teach youngsters to instill a sense of place — specifically downtown Honolulu — in their work.

The after-school and spring-break programs were started by Rich Richardson, proprietor of the The ARTS at Marks Garage, to “engage the kids into a conversation about revitalization and what was happening in the downtown area,” said Christie Knoll, who is teaching the courses.

Students create two different kinds of art: miniature street art installations placed around Chinatown and large-scale murals used as backdrops for performances at the Hawaii Theatre.

The miniature art installations were inspired by Slinkachu, a British artist and photographer whose work has been displayed in Europe and New York. Honolulu students have been creating miniatures for about a year, periodically installing them in out-of-the-way places in Chinatown, where they’ve proved to be so popular people are taking them home.

The classes take students through the artistic process, from inspiration to creation. They go on field trips through Chinatown and take cellphone photos of interesting sites for a miniature installation. From there they sketch out an idea, then create the sculpture, first using wire, then finishing it with a polymer sculpture material and painting it.

“They’re really miniature scenes that are interacting in an environment,” Knoll said. “Kids have to think of story-creating — how does an image tell a story? So there’s a lot more to it than just sculpting a little person and putting it on the street. There’s a message being sent there. … That empowers them because they have a voice.”

An example is a sculpture created by Henry Wu, a 13-year-old student at Kaimuki Middle School, of a worker in a hard hat pushing a wheelbarrow over a slice of pizza. Wu came to the class “not thinking he was an artist, just looking to do something,” Knoll said, but found his inspiration in J.J. Dolan’s, a custom pizzeria where he had never eaten.

He “intuitively” came up with a way to make a statement about “the relationship between what happens on the street and what happens in the stores, because there is a division there,” Knoll said.

“The little man is working. He’s not getting to enjoy the pizza. … He’s actually working, moving the pepperoni around.”

Eventually the class did get to eat at the restaurant, where they discussed concepts of entrepreneurship with the owner.

The murals will be developed and created during an intensive spring-break session. Teens will work with a professional local artist to design art for a performance at the Hawaii Theatre. In the past, students have worked with artists Solomon Enos and Meleanna Meyer, creating backdrops as large as 25 feet across.

“We don’t do anything in the middle. It’s either teeny-tiny or huge,” Knoll said with a laugh.