Series of murals to fill blank wall with city’s past, present
Five artists taking part in project to be unveiled in Sept.
Downtown Bryan is about to get a whole lot artsier, thanks to five new murals on the side of the Conlee-Garrett Moving and Storage building, which faces West 31st Street.
Sarah Norman and Katie Neason started thinking about murals in Bryan in December 2014 after their real estate agency, Renovation Wranglers, purchased property and built townhomes on West 31st Street, a few blocks from downtown. Norman said the part of the building facing the property was a big, blank wall that presented the city with an opportunity to have a public art gallery.
Partnering with the Downtown Bryan Association, Norman and Neason started West 31st Street Murals, putting out a call for submissions of possible murals that would represent the city’s past or present. Norman said they sorted through 15 applications, choosing five muralists — Cliff Collard, Mick Burson, Sarah Blackmon, Calina Mishay Johnson and Tyler Kay Reichert — to represent Bryan’s commerce, culture and community.
There will be five murals in total, several of which are already completed. The finished works will be formally unveiled during September’s First Friday in downtown Bryan.
Norman said the murals will be a “good drive-by art gallery” that could “bring people downtown who otherwise wouldn’t be.”
“We just thought it would be so great if people would drive by and stop to take their picture” by the murals, Norman said. “Our goal is first and foremost to get more people down here.”
In addition to bringing people downtown, Neason said the new art will “give people in the townhomes something to look at.” She said they are “definitely better to look at than having to look at a concrete wall.”
Sandy Farris, executive director of the Downtown Bryan Association, said the new art will act as a cultural magnet that could attract more people to the area.
“I always refer to downtown Bryan as ‘the community’s living room,’” Farris said of the culturally eclectic local hub, whose “geographical area is getting bigger. I think these murals are going to be a destination in and of themselves.”
Farris said that the collection of art displayed inside local businesses in addition to the outdoor murals “ties together and creates a really great atmosphere.”
There are already several outdoor displays throughout downtown, Farris said, “but nothing on this scale.”
Reichert, one of the five muralists, said her piece will feature two pictures of Bryan side-by-side, separated by a ribbon: a representation of the city “then” — in black and white — and “now” — in color.
Reichert started painting in mid-July and expects to be done before the end of the month. She paints from sunrise until 11:30 a.m., then takes a break to avoid the sun until about 3:30 p.m., then paints until dark. Reichert spent a year at Blinn College pursuing an economics degree but switched her major and left town after deciding on a different career path. That formative year made a mark on her life, and now she’s returning the favor by leaving a literal mark in downtown Bryan.
“It’s cool to come back here,” Reichert said. “I never thought I’d be muraling Bryan when I was an economics major here.”
Blackmon, who lives in North Bryan and also is finishing up a mural downtown, said her piece will be in the shape of a boot, within which will be iconic downtown fixtures such as the Queen Theater and La Salle Hotel.
“I included all the things that have meaning to the people who live in Bryan,” Blackmon said.
Johnson, another muralist, is already done with her piece, a black and white drawing of a small boy, flowers, a horse and the saying, “Wherever you go, go with all your heart.”
Johnson is a professional street artist who travels across the state with her husband, Kevin, to create art that’s representative of the community in which she works. She said she’d been creating projects in the western part of the state, and though she has no connection to Bryan, she was excited to make her way east to complete another project in a place smaller than major cities such as Austin or Houston.