Our Services

Open Letter :

The purpose of this letter is to let you know how you and/or your community, nonprofit group, or for-profit business can request our art services. We seek commissions to help us continue the visual arts as a public endeavor here in the metropolitan Philadelphia area, Bucks, Montgomery, Delaware counties in Pennsylvania.

Download the pdf :
BWTL Letter for hire


MCCF female inmates painting a mural
Mural BWTL painted alongside female inmates inside of Montgomery County Correctional Facility’s Female Visitation Room

Brush With the Law started in 2013 as a prison visual arts program that was conducted at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility. It provided art classes and mural painting to the prisoners within the confines of the jail itself. As Brush With the Law grew in popularity with participants, it was realized that the program could help provide better outcomes for those trying to re-enter their communities and supported this need to make a positive impact by creating and working together on creative jobs within local communities.

By working together a sense of community and achievement is found.

Where do you come in?

person posing on a pedestal block with a yellow smiley face over their face

By obtaining commissions from local businesses and/or working with different cities and municipalities these creative endeavors that we seek, design and paint or build together shed new light on people who for the most part feel shunned from society and introduces them to the public as individuals who are looking for acceptance. Creativity and art making brings along a new positive feeling of accomplishment.

We aim to build and develop relationships with organizations interested in joining this forward-thinking mission.


Always on the look out for the next project or job, we are constantly growing. If something requires permits or permissions, we figure out how to obtain what is needed from government officials. If fundraising or grant writing is necessary to help fund the project then we are here to help with that, too.

multi colored elephant graffiti

We do a lot of work in the community; some examples include: murals, art exhibits, classes, and creating conceptual art installations. The installations in particular are to help create public awareness on social issues, which include: substance use disorder, the unhoused, environment, climate change, and more.

We help with finding the way to fund projects. For a public endeavor—or an entity like a non-profit for public good—that needs help with funding, we help to make the vision a reality. This is accomplished by creating fundraisers to help finance the project or seeking out like minded sponsors who want to contribute as well as apply for seed grants in the local community.


Our beginnings

Founder and Director, Maria Maneos, started the city beautification project by calling upon local businesses and public works. She urged them to request the creation of visual art within their cities using Brush With the Law’s services.

Maneos received her Bachelors of Fine Arts Degree from Arcadia University in Glenside, PA and a Masters of Fine Arts Degree from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, PA. The Academy is not only the place where she learned how to draw and paint, but more importantly, taught how to take an idea and build upon it thoroughly and effectively.

image of a painting of the ocean, foggy, gentle ocean waves by Maria Maneos
Commissioned Painting, Private Owner, artist Maria Maneos Title: Passages 36″x60″

As an artist, Maneos always looks for opportunities to recognize and address a problem; while she also aids in change. The vision became clear that even in a small way her art education could help redirect destructive behaviors in displaced individuals.

First Lady Frances Wolf, Dr. Rachel Levine, and artist Maria Maneos at 2018 Art of the State Exhibit
5535-2017 chandelier sculpture of heroin baggies with crystals on view at Pa State Museum for Art of the State 2018. From left Maria Maneos, Artist, First Lady of Pa Frances Wolf, Pa Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine

The Realities of Brush with the law

Brush With the Law is a public charity nonprofit 501 (c)3 organization and works hard to find partnerships. We look to grow our partnerships with: neighborhoods/communities, rehabilitation centers, county jails, grassroots organizations, youth aid panels, artists, and other nonprofit organizations. We look to fulfill our commitment of visual integrity and the making of art to help bring people together; with great hopes to transform the divided. In the end, it is the act of doing the art that helps bring people together.

The average mural can cost thousands of dollars and painting can take at least 8–10 weeks. With the exorbitant cost of painting a mural and budgetary realities, we need you. Brush With the Law wants to continue our commitment of reintegrating people with society through the making of art. We ask that you help us find places that are meaningful and require beautification—both visually and metaphorically.

Murals and other works of art do not only have to be outside or on a wall. If of interest, you can commission pieces for interiors, parks, works on the floor or pavement and even hanging like a chandelier using out-of-the-box materials. Whatever you can imagine we can figure out a way to make it happen.