Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Ta-daaa ! ! !

The mural is sealed and done!! Well, for now at least... :-)




Be sure to check out the mural in real life- your computer screen just doesn't do justice for the awesomeness of the colors and design
in real life!

There are only a handful of Golden Bricks left. Now is your chance to show your support for this project! Please send $10 and the short message you want written on your brick to:

KAP c/o C3, 126 Main St., Northampton, MA 01060

Checks can be made out to Commonwealth Center for Change. Be sure to include your name and contact information! And thank you!

Friday, June 11, 2010

!WOW!

So much has happened in the past two days! Thanks to everyone who came out and helped bring the wall to life! The mural is quickly approaching completion, and we only have two work parties left! This is your last chance to help create the most vivid public art piece in Northampton!

SATURDAY 6/12 from 10am-2pm (finishing color!)
TUESDAY 6/15 from 2pm-4pm
(sealing the mural!)

Here are some visual records of the past two work parties...







(so.much.love.)

Kirkland Ave Project Video

Check out this
really great video
Henry White of NCTV
made last fall about the
Kirkland Ave Mural Project!!!

Monday, June 7, 2010

FRESH STARTS

Some photos from Saturday's wall priming...

Good Bye Pizza Punx!

Vanessa & Eben rocking it from bottom to top...

M E E T T O M This is Tom, also known as Boxcar. Tom dropped by on Saturday and gave us a hand with painting. Apparently he used to paint murals on commission of "old things, like canons, from the Civil War" on walls in California and elsewhere. He shared stories with us about thos eprojects, and told us a few tips for painting, such as putting water in the "pocket" of the paintbrushes before dipping them in the paint. This, Boxcar explained, would make cleaning the brushes a lot easier later on. He was a great presence during the workday, playing guitar and telling jokes, painting in the wide gaps in the bricks, holding the ladder, and even rummaging around town to find extra containers to pour paint into. He told the rest of us working on the mural that he was determined to "help see this thing through", and that he was happy to be a part of a "community building project." People sure can be great...

UPCOMING WORKDAYS:

Wednesday June 9, 11-3pm : Painting Color Begins!
Thursday June 10, 11-3pm : Painting Color continues...

Friday, June 4, 2010

Upcoming Open Workdays

SATURDAY June 5, 12-2pm : Priming the wall!
WEDNESDAY June 9th, 11-3pm : Painting the mural!
THURSDAY June 10th, 11-3pm : Painting the mural!

I will post more workdays as we go. Of course, no experience is necessary! Bring a friend or two! Come and go as you please! Please wear clothes you don't mind getting dirty. Contact me if you have a questions, haley@commonwealthcenter.org . Hope to see you soon!

Ode to the Pizza Punx


Through my work in the alley for the past year and a half, many people have come up to me to tell me their stories about the old mural under the overhang in Kirkland Ave, on the side of Downtown Sounds by Pleasant St. Many refer to it as the Pizza Punx mural (in reference to a scribbled crayon message written over the mural- one of very few cases of graffiti on the wall in a decade and a half!). This work was created collaboratively by a group of students led by Anne Hulley back in May of 1995. Fifteen years later, the mural has started to peel and fade, and the building owner is ready to give the wall a face lift. Though we will be painting over the old mural in order to expand the new one, I am confident the instrument wielding "Pizza Punx" it will live on forever in the legends of Kirkland Ave!

I feel a little funny about painting over something I've always had a certain fondness for in my heart, but in the same vein, I am excited to present an opportunity for the public to see contemporary new art in downtown Northampton. A lot of what I find fascinating about making art in the public sphere is the amount of embodied histories there are in the spaces we choose to focus on. The "Pizza Punx" have certainly added a lot of character to the Northampton urban landscape!