Mural fever
Group seeks to commission 12 new works in Yuma
To help beautify the Yuma community and promote the arts, a local committee is hoping to bring artists, businesses and sponsors together to create 12 murals by the end of the year.
The NexGen Arts Committee is searching for professional muralists for the Mural-A-Month project. The goal, noted NexGen president Matt Molenar, is to change building exteriors to creative canvases for the community and visitors alike.
For the project, the group will commission 12 site-specific murals throughout Yuma.
“We originally came up with a budget of $10,000 to do 12 murals in 12 months all around Yuma,” Molenar explained. “Some would be bigger and some would be smaller and we would pay muralists accordingly based on the scope of the project.
“We wrote a grant for that and we got funded halfway from the Arizona Community Foundation of Yuma,” he added. “That means we have enough money to do six murals.”
Ultimately, he noted, the committee would like to have all 12 murals completed by the conclusion of 2018.
“We are really hoping for a little bit of mural fever now that MOMO has completed his big one,” he said. “Not everything needs to be a grand, huge project, however. The MOMO project is completely independent from the Mural-A-Month project. It’s all public art, though, and everyone has this common goal of more public art for the community all throughout Yuma.”
MOMO is an international artist who recently completed an abstract mural on an exterior back wall of the Yuma Art Center.
City Arts and Program Manager Lindsay Benacka, noted that “there is a huge surge across the community for public art across the board with a lot of different projects.”
With Mural-A-Month, Molenar hopes to spread some Yuma pride online as well. Thus far, one mural has been completed on one of the outside walls of MGM Design in downtown Yuma, where Molenar is the president of the business.
Local artist Lia Littlewood completed the mural with the help of her sister and fellow artist, Stefanie Littlewood. The mural is interspersed with bright colors and features some Yuma pride.
“My vision and my dream is that when everybody parks in the parking lot and walks past this building they are greeted with this awesome piece of public art,” Molenar said. “Hopefully they take a selfie in front of it and put it on social media.”
Molenar added that the committee wishes to leave a positive impression for visitors as well with the project.
Initially, Benacka explained that MuralA-Month stemmed from “like minded individuals” who deemed it be an attainable goal that was “large enough to have a big reach.”
Muralists interested in participating should have prior experience working on large-scale public art projects. Murals will be promoted and featured on an interactive website that will offer self-guided tours of the murals and all public art in the area.
The committee is working with local businesses and organizations to secure wall space, permits and necessary approval by the City of Yuma’s Design and Historic Review Commission.
Each mural project will be determined jointly by individual property owners and the NexGen Art Committee. The committee is also seeking interested property owners.
Additionally, the committee will work with the artist(s) selected to secure travel, lodging, supplies and a competitive artist stipend as needed for each mural.
Criteria for selection include artwork that is the artist’s original idea and assembly and artwork that will be able to be displayed long-term in high heat desert temperatures. The murals must also be durable and weather resistant.
The project is sponsored by the Arizona Community Foundation and the City of Yuma.
More information for interested sponsors, businesses and artists is available by calling (928) 373-5212 or by emailing Murals@ArtinYuma.com.