The Greater Mondawmin Community Association and Artblocks, winners of the 2012 PNC Transformative Art Prize, have officially broken ground on installing 5 life-sized elephant sculptures in Druid Hill Park.
Stop by on Wednesday, June 11 at 2:30 pm for the unveiling celebration!
Forever Together / I Am Here Because Its Home by Stephen Powers
The first time I met Steve Powers, he climbed out of the big white BOPA family van sporting a yellow raincoat and a Guided by Voices T shirt. The world-renowned Philly-born graff-writer-turned-Fulbright-scholar was in town for a marathon of cross-city site visits and community meetings for our upcoming Love Letter to Baltimore project this fall. (Haven’t heard much about it yet? That’s because we’re still planning it!) When Housing offered up the wall space for what Steve called a “temporary forever” mural, he tacked that onto his trip.
I showed him the lift and pointed out the wall at 2454 E. Eager Street—the corner house in a row of city-owned vacants slated to be demolished later this summer.
He quickly walked passed it and all the way down Eager Street. The yellow raincoat floating behind him made him look like a mad scientist.
When he came back he asked if they were all vacant. I said they were, that we had just planned on the wall at 2454, but we could ask about the rest.
Less than 24 hours later we were signing a right of entry agreement for 35 properties; Steve ordered 10 gallons of “Ravens Purple” and a power generator for his paint sprayer and got to work. Not on painting, but on talking to the people who live next door—on Montford, on Eager, on Port—about what they love and what they hate about their city.
So began the first line of Steve ESPO Powers’s Love Letter to Baltimore: FOREVER TOGETHER / I AM HERE BECAUSE ITS HOME.
Can’t wait for the rest.
Prepping the wall for “I Am Here Because Its Home”
Sketching out the V in “Forever”
“Temporary is permanent and together can be forever” – Steve Powers on his temporary mural which spans from 2402-2454 E. Eager St.
Muralist, conservationist, and public art trail-blazer, Meg Saligman, boasts some of the largest single-project murals in the country. Her 2008 Omaha mural, Fertile Ground, measures upwards of 32,500 square feet. For over 20 years, she’s been at the forefront of the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and has created work across the U.S. and as far as Africa.
Evolving Face. 2010. Philadelphia, PA. Golden exterior acrylic, non woven media, LED lights and custom steel. 6000 square feet.
On Wednesday, June 11, the Lunder Conservation Center will present a free public lecture with the artist herself at the Smithsonian American Art Museum & National Portrait Gallery in DC.
THE DETAILS:
Preserving Public Art: The Murals of Meg Saligman
Nan Tucker McEvoy Auditorium
8th and G Street NW, Washington D.C.
Wednesday, June 11, 2014, 6 – 7pm
Doors Open at 5:30pm
No tickets required
Can’t make it down to DC for the lecture? Stream it online at the Smithsonian’s website HERE.