IN MURALS, EACH LETTER MATTERS New BLM works in city offer lessons

Work on a colossal Black Lives Matter street mural began Friday in Harlem, with Mayor de Blasio lauding it as the perfect place to amplify the movement’s message.

“[We are saying] to the whole world [that] black lives matter. And to say it in Harlem —which is to the world the example of the greatness in black America — this is the place where the message of black America was spread all over the country [and] all over the world,” de Blasio said Friday at the uptown unveiling. “So this is the place where we must have this mural.”

“Remember the mural is only the beginning,” he said. “The mural says what needs to be said but now we have to turn it into action.”

De Blasio announced last month that city-approved Black Lives Matter murals would appear along Joralemon St. between Adams and Court Sts. in Brooklyn, Richard Terrace between Hamilton Ave. and Ferry Terminal Viaduct on Staten Island, 153rd St. between Jamaica and Archer Aves. in Queens, Morris

Ave. between 161st and 162nd Sts. in the Bronx, and on Centre St. between Worth and Reade Sts. in lower Manhattan.

The mayor delayed plans on Thursday to paint a mural on Fifth Ave. in front of President Trump’s flagship skyscraper, citing logistics as reason for the postponement.

In lower Manhattan, artists Tijay Mohammed, Sophia Dawson and Patrice Payne — who designed the large letters along Centre St. near Foley Square, spanning three blocks — worked with over 35 painters starting on Wednesday to create their BLM mural.

“I’m paying homage to the ancestors,” said Mohammed, 35, of the Bronx, who oversaw the creative direction for the word “Black.”

Mohammed smiled as he stood next to the letters, filled with bold, colorful Adinkra symbols from his native Ghana.

“All symbols have their own meanings in terms of putting them together to make a statement,” he told the Daily News.

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer teamed up with the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs, WYX Architecture + Urban Design and the group Tats Cru to push the projects through following citywide protests over the death of George Floyd, who died after a Minneapolis cop kneeled on his neck for several minutes.

“Black Lives Matter needs communication to exist — and for me, one of the ways to do that is through art,” she said on Thursday of the lower Manhattan

project. “It’s a perfect location, especially because of all of the protests that have marched down [Centre St.].”

“Art matters,” she said on Friday at the Harlem unveiling. “We have to build on what’s going on at this wonderful mural.”

Nikoa Evans, executive director of the organization Harlem Park to Park, also helped to conceptualize the uptown artwork.

“We embody what Black Lives Matter means,” she said. “We are the epicenter of what this culture represents and what we’ve contributed to the world. We helped build our past. We are going to make sure we help shape our future.”

On Centre St., Dawson was tasked with the word “Lives,” and opted to decorate the “L” with images of mothers and their children.

“Half of this country is not sensitive to seeing a person of color pass away. But a mother’s loss of a child, that’s a universal thing,” said 32-year-old Dawson, an art teacher from East New York, as she worked on the blacktop.

“The goal … is to try to get those who don’t feel to feel [and] who don’t see to see,” she said.

Payne, 35, who is also a Brooklyn art teacher, oversaw the creative direction for the word “Matter.”

“When you look up the definition, it’s not only physical matter but [it] also [means] existence, being important … being relevant,” she said.

Payne said each letter will signify a theme from the movement, with the “Ts” representing tradition and triumph to the “E” that stands for an evolving political environment.

“I wanted each letter to represent something … from our ancestry,” she said. “We are constantly going through a moment of evolution where things are going to be different after this … We don’t know what’s going to happen but we are hopeful that there will be some positive change.”