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| Me in front of a mural painted by William Walker called "Childhood is Without Prejudice" |
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| Tour Guide Jon Pounds |
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| People at the tour with me |
For my second trip I went on a tour to see the murals of Hyde Park. It was a very interesting trip with discoveries about the artist that I never knew. I chose this in particular because I have been through Hyde Park many times, but never took the time out to enjoy the murals in the viaducts. We had a very kind guide by the name of Jon Pounds (Executive Director of the Chicago Public Art Group), who took us through and answered our questions about the amazing artwork. Here are some pictures that inspired me along the way.
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| Albert Zeno |
This oil paint was done by a man named Albert Zeno, called "Alewives and Mercury Fish" (1972). This mural was about the pollution of the Great Lakes by factorys and the invasion of Alewives fish into fresh water. He linked mans enslavement of nature to the enslavement of black people, which going through the mural they both become free. The thing that really drew me to this piece was the fact that little is known about Mr. Zeno. He is not famous like the other painters and as a matter of fact he was a poor man who lived in his car, while he did volunteer work painting murals. According to our tour guide, he was helping paint another mural , when he asked for some paint for himself. He then went across the viaduct and painted his own mural. The little people know about him is that he had no formal training, he just painted. He then after a while could not be found and a search was sent out for him. Later, Mr. Pound told us that he had died. What inspired me was here is a ordinary man that was not known to the public as a great anything, but painted a mural that has had a impact on the Hyde Park viaducts for more than 35 years. Since he had no voice in the "popular artistic circle", his work (a lasting legacy) speaks volumes in the viaducts of Hyde Park.
The name of this painting is "Maskamorphosis" by Calvin Jones. It was done with acrylic paint on canvas. his one of a number of paintings that are of African influence. The mask point to the duality of good and evil. Since it is a metamorphisis he uses the vibrant color and line-work to capture the transition between the two sides. You can really tell the sides apart due to the calm expression on the mask's face to the left opposed to the one on the right. You can almost feel the change between the two sides from the color directly in the middle of the picture. Another very interesting fact about Mr. Jones is that while he created paintings he was declared legally blind. He had like a sort of tunnel vision to where he could only see a few inches in front of him. He would compose his art on napkins or anything he could find to construct these paintings. In my opinion with the state of his vision this was an amazing feat. To be able to create art in spite of his setback and also for it to come out as good as it did in his collection. This painting reminds me also of the ultimate roles we can choose in life. Which do we choose to rise above the trials of life or be morphed into a monster created by them?
The third piece that inspired me was created by Olivia Gude, the wife of our tour guide Mr. Pounds. The title of this mural is "Where We Come From....Where We're We Going". It was created using acrylic paint on the walls of the viaduct. The inspiration for this piece was the racial tension between people in Chicago. So she started to create this mural asking people of different races the question, where are you going? The question became one that could be answered in many ways. The end result was the answers ranged from spiritual, physical, and mental. She got the name from the philosopher Plato when he asked, "Where are you coming from and where are you going." The people in the mural are the actual people she met to answer her question. This was a not only an art piece for social change between races, but it started a conversation of the introspective. I like how she conveys the busy expressions on some of their faces that catch them in transition. It inspired me because how all races are depicted on the same level of finding some type of destination. When we think about it, some of our answers are not that different at all. We have more in common than we all realize regardless of race. This piece made me ask myself the same question of where do I want to go in the future? What exactly do I want to be regarding art and how do I get there? To me there is no greater experience than the spark of thought that can ignite the passion for creating art that comes from the soul.
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