community representation
MIRRORING A COMMUNITY TO ITSELF
An unconventional portrait of Richmond, viewed from within. Painted in a historic residence, built 1892.
“Hope Mural, located at 2907 Marshall. Chris Visions collaborated with Emily Herr in creating a tribute Mural to lost loved ones in the midst of riots and unrest in the city. Those portrayed are Elijah McClain (Left, Murdered 2019), Marcus David Peters (Center, Murdered 2018), Brandon Gerald Robertson (Right, Lost to Suicide 2019). (Painted in the Summer of 2020)” - Chris Visions’ portfolio www.chrisvisions.com
This piece is a love letter and an invitation to love. A pair of roses silhouette a painted collage - the pictures I filled this space with are all slices of Richmond. Glimpses of skyline, reflections on the river, phone lines against the sky all blur together to create a warm textured portrait of the city.
As shown below, the first layer of this process is the energetic broad strokes of this portrait, creating an abstract frenzy of color. The second layer is the delicate transparent white that carves away at the frenzy to sculpt the shapes of the two roses. For me this is a joyful and honest display of the creative process - “write drunk, edit sober” as they say. It also alludes to the romaticization of everyday life - every day is over-filled with criss-crossing intentions and plot-lines, but with a gentle and visionary hand, you can compose the story of your experience that you want to tell.
From Quirk Hotel’s website: Each room not only spotlights Richmond's established artists, but supports its next generation of talent with a percentage of each booking benefiting VisArt's Make Space, a program pairing sixth-grade girls with female artists for a year of mentorship and art-making.
Charlotte's mom Sarah wanted to give her (extremely adorable) child the mural that she wished she'd had in her room as a little girl. We gathered lots of reference images - Edmund Dulac illustrations, chinoiserie, art deco paintings, illustrated manuscripts, persian miniatures - and made a big list of colors and subject matter. Once I had some sketches to work with, we went back and forth on composition, layout, color ways, and little additions (like tiny deer in the background).
On my grandfather's shed, I painted a collage of important icons: the Pennsylvania Railroad, the beautiful rolling countryside, and a ruby-throated hummingbird.
My friend Ellie and I threw this cutie up in just NINE HOURS! Basically from sunup to sundown (winter sunlight, what can i say) we did some quick painting and decision-making, not to mention learning how to use spray paint for the first time. The design is based on a print Ellie did of this neighborhood (Bushwick), smooshed with my Thrive motif.
This is a communal wall offered by a spray paint shop called Low Brow Artique, which means we painted over someone else's art to put ours up. In turn our mural was painted over after just two days - unusually fast for that spot, but our image was also a pretty unusual style in a neighborhood totally covered in all kinds of graffiti. Next time, we're determined to find somewhere a little more permanent.
Chesapeake Bank commissioned this mural to beautify the construction site for their first Richmond branch. Designed specifically for the site, the mural runs the full length of the block, capping the corners with detailed portraits of iconic local buildings and sights.
To create these portraits, I started by walking around to many local businesses in the Westhampton shopping area (Grove Ave, Libbie Rd, Patterson Ave) and asking people what they thought of as iconic to their community - which people, buildings, fixtures, events, and etc characterize the area? Many people were somewhat bemused - though they'd lived and worked in the area for a long time, they didn't see their surroundings as "iconic". Nevertheless I ended up with a long list of businesses that had been there for 20, 30, and 40 years, repeated imagery like the streetlights, and groups of people like joggers and shoppers. (Many subjects were mentioned over and over by those same bemused people - hopefully these images act as a mirror for them to see the lovely character of their neighborhood!)
More details below about different parts of the installation.
This mural imagines the mountains that climbers prepare for, set against the Richmond skyline and combined with Triangle’s namesake logo-shape. Spot gloss accents give an extra dimension to the design.
The Richmond skyline was constructed from a dozen aerial photographs, reproduced with as much accuracy as possible to show the shape of the city hugging the James River.
Kosovo is a young country with a long history, and its identity is in the hands of today's young people.
The locations depicted are scenes from my introduction to Ferizaj, where the city streets are busy and close, and the consistent background of the mountains is revealed between buildings. The blank wall at the center is a message of possibility to the students in the university who will see this in class.
This is the first indoor wall to be part of this program, located at the University of Applied Sciences in Ferizaj. I was blown away by the amazing program of MuralFest Kosova and how much this team has positively impacted their city, not just during a summer art festival but year-round, for seven years. My hope is that this mural can symbolize the impact they have had, and hold it up as an example for how to involve oneself in the work being done to build the future of your home.