While they could see the value in a street art festival, the co-founders say that convincing others - funders, sponsors - wasn't always so easy. We knew that ten years ago, and we know it now." But we also understood that someone could come in and buy that site at any time, and take down the art. The owners are in Baltimore and we called them and they were cool with it. "The Power Plant is an old industrial property, and hard to refurbish, and for whatever reason it hasn't sold. Richmond now has more than 150 murals in and around the city and has often used the artwork in its tourism and promotional materials."And Ed said, I would do anything to have access to this wall." Trask says that he had always wanted to put up an outdoor gallery at the Power Plant, lying moribund and unkept, or a skatepark."We just happened to walk by the Power Plant one day," recalls Baliles. It was the first time I felt like I was an artist, a lovely experience."Īt the same time, Baliles, the son of former Virginia Governor Gerald Baliles (and later a member of Richmond City Council) traveled to Venice, where he saw renowned contemporary artist Shepard Fairey painting in St. "I had come off of a three week volunteer job where I painted this mural in southern Brazil. The initial idea for a multi-artist mural fest came from watching how distant places had used public art to beautify and to spark conversations, Trask says. So, yeah, this is an re-introduction, of sorts." "We had planned one for spring of 2020 along Dock Street but we know how that planned out, and in 2021 we had Omicron lingering. "The last one was at the Diamond in 2017," says Baliles. The festival has taken over four different city sites since 2012, but it's been missing for five years. "It's something that inspired an entire generation - ten years - of public artists." "Without a street art festival, there would be no Mending Walls," he says. In 2020, he created Mending Walls RVA, a public art initiative that promotes collaboration between artists of different cultures to create murals across the city. Glass, then an architect, has since become a muralist of some note - his latest epic painting will grace the side of Richmond's Amazon distribution center. getting the chance to paint next to professional painters was an incredible opportunity." "I saw how it transformed that space and I became more jazzed about public art and the possibilities. Richmond artist Hamilton Glass, who has done great community art work, says he was inspired by the inaugural Richmond Street Art Festival in 2012.įor Hamilton Glass, the first Richmond Street Art Festival was inspirational both as a participant and an onlooker."He didn't like what he did ten years ago and wanted to do another one, and we thought it would be a cool way to show everyone that there's new art coming," says Baliles. Broth has already painted the first mural of the event, unofficially titled "The Witch," which was unveiled when this year's festival was officially announced in April. Hamilton has done amazing community art-driven work, and Mickael has become a great artist with murals and sculptures." (Trask, Glass and Broth are the three "legacy" painters returning to the Power Plant this year). They did their first big murals at that festival and look at them now. Look at the new generation of artists who were inspired by what happened here ten years ago, like Hamilton Glass and Mickael Broth. "In ten years, the talent pool in Richmond has just exploded. This year's return will feature only homegrown talent, says co-founder Ed Trask, the acknowledged godfather of Richmond murals. That first year featured a mixture of nationally-known artists making giant paintings - like Mark Jenkins, who created the distinctive "Target" mural with the 3-D darts - alongside a few emerging Richmond artists. It has become an iconic spot in the city." You can't have a promotional video promoting Richmond that doesn't have footage of that site in it. "The murals from 2012 have become such an identifying part of Richmond. With more than a dozen different muralists in tow, the festival returns to where it all began, in the Reynolds North development along the Haxall Canal, on Sept. "None of us can believe that they've lasted ten years," says Jon Baliles, the co-founder of the weekend mural showcase, a semi-regular happening credited for helping to spur a cultural awakening in public art in the city. An occasional graffiti tag aside, the familiar 36-foot-high murals created ten years ago for the first RVA Street Art Festival still stand, as striking as the day they were painted, on the abandoned Power Plant building.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |