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Date: 7/25/2022
BELCHERTOWN – Following community feedback sessions on July 14 and 15, the Belchertown Community Alliance (BCA) is preparing for the design phase for its mural project which is set to be put up at 6 Berkshire Ave.
BCA Board President April Jasak-Bangs sat down with Reminder Publishing to discuss the work on the mural, including the workshop.
“The Belchertown Community Alliance is collaborating with Commonwealth Murals, and they are the ones who are helping us do the nuts-and-bolts piece of it, which is really wonderful. We’re really excited that it’s very much a community-centered and focus project, and that really got started this past Thursday at the Creative Visioning Workshop,” she said.
Jasak-Bangs also detailed the funding for the project, which includes $1,000 from the Belchertown Cultural Council and $8,000 from Commonwealth Places, which is part of Mass Development’s one-stop grants program. She added that the BCA would be matching both grants for a total project commitment of $18,000.
Jasak-Bangs said the community workshop was hosted by Britt Rhue, the director of Commonwealth Murals.
“The community workshop was a hybrid event and we had about 30 participants that night who talked about Belchertown and how it played a role in their lives and our hopes and dreams for the future of Belchertown and future generations,” she said.
Following the workshop, Jasak-Bangs said the feedback was narrowed down to two questions before being brought to the Food Truck Friday event on July 15.
“We were collecting feedback there and we had a few questions that we were asking people on big white pieces of paper that they answered, so their favorite place in Belchertown and then completing the sentence ‘If you really knew Belchertown you would know…,’” she said. “We had a lot of really wonderful responses from that.”
With the feedback collected, Jasak-Bangs said the next step is for Rhue and muralist Pablo Kalaka to come up with a design that reflects Belchertown. She added that Kalaka is an internationally renowned artist.
“He has done work all over the world – France, Germany, Central and South America, recently in Minneapolis and he has done some work in New York too – so we’re very lucky to get such a talented and experienced muralist to do the first large-scale mural in town,” she said.
She added that the design for the project will be completed by Aug. 1.
“He is going to come up with the design, we are going to provide some feedback and if necessary, he will do some tweaks, and then we will present the final design to the Select Board on Aug. 1,” Jasak-Bangs said. “We need approval for that because it is going up on a town-owned building.”
With Select Board approval, it will be up to Rhue and Kalaka to turn the design into a giant paint by number piece using a mural poly tab fabric so the community can paint parts of the mural.
“We are going to have two paint parties. We are going to have a paint party on Aug. 19 from 4 to 8 [p.m.], that is in conjunction with Food Truck Fridays on the common. Then we are going to be going to the farmers market on Aug. 21 from 10 [a.m.] to 2 [p.m.] on the common as well,” she said.
She added that residents of all ages and abilities will be able to participate and paint a piece of the mural.
“Once the mural is totally painted, Pablo is going to take that poly tab mural fabric, bring it back to his studio and put the pieces together and do some shading to make sure that seams aren’t showing,” Jasak-Bangs said.
For the paint parties, Jasak-Bangs added that the BCA is looking for volunteers to help staff the events and anyone interested is encouraged to reach out to hello@btowncommunity.org to sign up.
So far, Jasak-Bangs said she has been happy with the community input for the mural.
“I’m seeing a bunch of different types of community members coming together and showing pride for Belchertown and the great community that we live in, and to hear all of the positive things that people love about living in Belchertown has been such a joy for me personally,” she said.
She added that she hopes residents bring that same level of enthusiasm when it comes time to paint.
“We are all going go be working on a common goal together to create this piece of art that is going to be around for generations and that is really exciting,” Jasak-Bangs said. “You can be walking or driving down Berkshire Ave. coming from the Lake Wallace loop, and you can point up and be like, ‘I painted that little piece of that picture up there,’ and really feel ownership.”
Jasak-Bangs said the mural is expected to be completed sometime in September.