The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Work on mural begins at auto shop
Muzik’s Auto Care founded in 1942
Lorain’s newest mural will show off a business that has been in town since 1942.
Artist Mike Sekletar may be best known for his painted tributes to Lorain County veterans, or wallsized postcards created for Lorain and Vermilion.
On Aug. 23, Sekletar began work on a new sign for Muzik’s Auto Care, 704 W. Erie Ave.
Mike Sekletar, Val Fiehl and Sekletar’s father, John, used an overhead projector to cast an image of a retroinspired Muzik Bros. Auto Care logo onto the wall.
Mike Sekletar and Fiehl used paint pens to trace an outline onto the block wall.
Painting started the evening of Aug. 24.
The work will be on the back wall, which faces Lorain City Hall and is visible as drivers cross the Charles Berry Bascule Bridge to head west on West Erie Avenue.
For years, the building’s back wall was hidden because it was obscured by the former Walter A. Frey Funeral Home.
The wall was exposed when the city purchased the funeral home and demolished it earlier this year.
With the funeral home gone, the wall was a blank slate, said John Muzik, owner of the auto shop.
The mural is better than a blank wall, and the work supports a local artist, Muzik said.
“Mike was the only person I ever contacted to do this job,” he said. “It seemed like an honor to have him do it because of what he’s done around the county. Hopefully, people like it.”
The vacant lot has a place in Lorain history.
The funeral home once was the home of George Wickens, the Lorain mayor who in 1894 and 1895, guided development of the steel mills that became part of the city’s 20th century industrial identity.