Exciting news this week! I was awarded the NYC Dept. of Transportation Barrier Beautification mural project! 1,980 square feet is the size of the mural I will be painting. My largest canvas ever (by far!). The catch is - the mural is only 3 feet high. And 840 feet long. And it is spread out over half a mile.
The DOT’s Barrier Beautification project pairs a local artists with portions of New York’s protected bike lane network to turn what would otherwise be a concrete slab into a work of art. I will be painting the concrete barrier that runs along Clinton Street between Delancey and South Street. A huge thank you to Matt Pietrus, urban planner for the Lower East Side for accompanying me on my first site visit in almost a year.
The design concept for Clinton Street is a continuation of my mural completed in 2020 for the Town of Kittery, Maine. Named “Barrier Reefs”, the mural was inspired by the estuarine life found in the local harbor and waterways.
The new Barrier Reefs mural will continue this series (I guess now I can call it a series?), with abstracted forms depicting life found in New York Harbor - that helps to construct natural barrier reefs - so oysters, clams, mussels and other sessile organisms. A huge thank you to the Billion Oyster Project and the work of Agata Poniatowski in creating the Species Identification Guide, which was my primary point of research in designing the mural.
The concept suits the site well as the bike lane ends (or begins) right next to Pier 35 (which holds a specially designed tidal habitat for mussels!) and of course, the East River.
More updates to come! If you are in New York between June 20 and July 8 and would like to lend a hand (or just say hi!), please let me know. No painting experience necessary.
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