New mural on campus

theahspepperbox

Mar 27

Ilana Maclay, News Editor

27th March, 2023

AAI students paint wall outside the FAB.
(Photo Credit: Ossian Briar-Bopanne)

You may have seen the halfway-painted, bright pink wall outside of the cafeteria on the FAB. What's going on with that?

"We're going to be completing two mural projects [this year]," Tim Clewell, AAI mural masterclass teacher, said. "We've got one that's right outside the music wing in the FAB–the bright pink one–and I'm waiting on approval from PG&E to paint a box outside of the FAB."

He said, "My students wanted to express the jubilance, the celebration of life, as though this person was at kind of like a concert. They wanted to capture that jubilance that you feel when you're amongst a crowd of people, like a community of people, enjoying the same music as you are through this image."

The artwork for the mural was designed by Frida King and a group of students in Clewell's masterclass.

"My group's idea was a connection to music and a connection to community through music. So, I came up with a design representing that, which involves a lady coming out of a flower and a bunch of music and bright colors and stuff," junior Frida King said. "We're just starting to paint that. Right now, we're calling it the Pepto Bismol commercial because it's bright pink, but we're slowly working in the process."

Clewell described that his role overseeing the student-run project includes showing students what it takes to paint a mural. Designing, the approval process, the application of paint, and the gridding process. Gridding to enlarge something is taking a grid and placing it out so the students can paint proportionally.

"Murals take a hell of a long time," King said. "The mural that this masterclass painted last year took both semesters, and we're trying to do it in one. But, there's a lot of us and I think we can get it done. The rain is a potential dampener, but we're on an overhang so it should be okay. We're going to start gridding soon and hopefully, we'll finish it by spring. We'll see."

So, keep an eye out for the new murals! To find it now, just look for the "Pepto Bismol" pink and the students painting it.

"It's fun to paint a mural," King said.