Let’s support artists who make our city beautiful.
My friend and formal colleague from Sanders\Wingo, Bradford Maxfield posted pics on Facebook of another mural installation completed by Studio Bradlio. This one is a beautiful inspiration in the Ascension Seton hospital that captures its mission. He brings a distinctive style to his work that he’s formed in his vocation as an artist, and as a commercial designer in advertising that is leading to a prolific exposition of his talent throughout Central Texas.
Author Paul Britton also posted a photo essay of the 21st Street Co-op, the eclectic housing cooperative I lived while attending the University of Texas that’s full of murals. He captured the feel of this special place in West Campus with pieces that survived my time living there in the mid 1990s.
Both posts in this morning’s feed remind me of an idea I got while visiting Montreal in November 2018. I learned about the annual Montreal Mural Festival, a citywide week-long event where artists travel from around the world to make the city more beautiful one wall at a time.
Likewise, whenever we visit Philadelphia, we always take time to walk Magic Gardens created by Isaiah Zagar. His mosaic work is much like Simon Rodia’s at Watts Towers in Los Angeles with disposable media like colorful glass bottles and tile. Here in south Austin, we have our own Cathedral of Junk in the backyard of artist Vince Hanneman.
These are whimsical walk-through wonderlands of creativity with childlike nostalgia. In Zagar’s case, he extended into his community with commissions throughout his South Philly neighborhood. Philadelphia has taken care to tell the story of their city’s public art through MuralArts.org.
We need to bring that artful spirit to Austin! Our city routinely appears in top lists as the best place to live, work and visit. We have a strong history of festivals from Aquafest in the 90s to SXSW every March.
Lessor known, Austin has become a mural city in is own right with guided and self-guided mural tours: Do512, Austin.com, GPS, Carrie Colbert, Viator. Our murals are everywhere inside and out.
I imagine a patronage grant to properly catalogue these unique pieces of art would be quite useful for visitors and citizens alike in the form of a mobile app. As a member of MCN, I appreciate the particular care museum curators and digital professionals take to properly catalogue works of art. Such a project would aim to capture the art with public contributions of media, locations and history behind the commissions.
I’d love to be part of a civic movement that takes care to steward these important pieces of street art within an app. To do it well, I imagine involvement from museum curators, the Austin Historical Society, a digital agency, the Austin Ad Council with stakeholders from the local chamber and city council might make this happen. Who knows, perhaps Austin might create another invitational festival.
