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Date: 3/17/2020
WESTFIELD – ArtWorks of Westfield is bringing together city officials, artists, and the community to create public murals across the city after a social media post sparked public interest in murals.
Shannon Chiba, the project lead for the public mural, said the idea began two years ago when a social media post sparked the public’s interest in creating public murals. “It generated tons of public interest, more so than many of the programs that we’ve done,” she said, “Since our mission is to bring people to art and enliven the city, we decided that we would run with this and see what we could do.”
She said the current plan is to put the mural up on the pedestrian underpass between Taylor and Hedges Street but the location is ultimately up to the public if they decide on another location.
One of Chiba’s biggest goals for the project is to bring the community together. “What’s important to me is trying to bring all facets of the city together from all age groups and all abilities. I would love to see a true community collaborative effort where people feel happy and like they’ve accomplished something to help others,” she said.
In order to bring the community together for the mural Chiba said ArtWorks also put together a public mural committee for the project and has been working closely with the city since its inception. “We’re really working with the city right now through the planning board to get all of the appropriate approvals and all of the appropriate people are notified, so Cheryl Crowe is really running with that,” she said.
Chiba explained that the artists on the committee will take suggestions from the community and use their own ideas to create the mural. “The artists that join the mural committee will do the design aspect, but we will take suggestions from the city and form a cohesive piece,” she said, “Then it will be up to the people who want to paint to come down and paint before the artists touch up the piece.”
Chiba said that putting the mural up is just phase one of the project. She said, “It will be a work in progress, over time murals fade. It’ll be continually monitored and touched up by the mural committee and even the public so we can keep it beautiful and standing for a long time.”
Chiba explained that a project on this scale is going to be expensive for ArtWorks. She said, “It’s very expensive, just paint alone is huge. Hopefully we’ll be able to get local stores and people who have access to materials involved with some type of sponsorship. We’re going to need people to truly invest in it with their abilities and to help pitch in monetarily.”
Chiba added that this first mural is just the beginning for ArtWorks’ mural projects. “Whether it’s public or private, I can tell you murals will come to Westfield,” she said, “There’s just so much support that I can’t see how it won’t happen.”
While ArtWorks had planned on holding its first public meeting for the mural on March 14, Chiba said in an email that the meeting had been postponed until further notice and any updates on the project would be available on the ArtWorks Westfield Facebook page. Public input and ideas will be accepted online.
In addition to the meeting regarding the mural ArtWorks Westfield Board of Directors instituted what it called “significant changes” to its upcoming schedule of community art and cultural activities.
Articulture Westfield, scheduled for May 1 and 2, 2020 was canceled and the Westfield Youth Art Show, scheduled for May 2 at the Westfield Boys & Girls Club to coincide with the Articulture Westfield event, was postponed indefinitely.
The last two stops on the Westfield Community Poetry Experience tour scheduled for March 21 and April 18 have been postponed and will be rescheduled when the CDC, state and local officials declare it safe to do so.
The Downtown Live! Friday Night Concert series scheduled to begin on June 19 and the OPen Air OPen Mic planned for Wednesday evenings on the Park Square Green from June to August will take place as scheduled, pending new information.