A mural with meaning
Artists communicate a message of healing to community struggling through pandemic
The first thing that catches your eye are the colors. Vibrant hues radiate off the white background, almost demanding your gaze, while a stampede of animals and assorted plant life draw you in to each minute detail of the mural being created on the side of a building on West Cordova Road.
For the past two weeks, members of the Santa Fe-based multimedia environmental education collective All Aboard Earth, headed by brothers Michael and Jonathan Meade, have worked to finish the eye-popping mural.
Hannah Rapp, who operates the naturebased expressive arts therapy practice Playful Passages, is also a partner in the project.
The vibrant 20-by-12-foot mural is being created on a wall donated by Body of Santa Fe owner Lori Parrish. It is called All Life is Sacred ,or The Great Coming Together. The mural, at 333 W. Cordova Road, is funded via a Santa Fe Arts and Culture Department mini-CARES Act grant, which helps kickstart projects that address COVID-19 safe practices.
Jonathan Meade, All Aboard Earth’s creative arts director, said the group hoped to offer a positive, uplifting vision for Santa Feans that also addresses both the stress and isolation that people might feel during the pandemic.
“I feel called to address the challenges of separation and feeling disconnected from our communities at this time,” Jonathan Meade said. “How isolation has heightened levels of depression and suicide and exacerbated mental health issues. I hope to convey a sense of togetherness and solidarity to help people feel safe during this time of immense pain and grief.”
The group plans to hold a small celebration in front of the mural from 10 a.m. to
4 p.m. Saturday.
The central figure of the piece is an homage to the Tewa people, an archetype of the “universal mother,” nurturing a small Earth in her hands.
On the right of the mural, a buffalo, deer,
snake, roadrunner and giraffe, each carefully selected for their symbolic representations, almost sprout out of the mural, while prehistoric dinosaurs and aquatic animals hint at the area’s geologic past.
A variety of plants also can be found across the mural. Jonathan Meade said they represent spiritual and homeopathic medicines, which have been historically used to soothe pain and suffering.
A man and crescent moon are at the bottom of the mural, symbolizing hardworking laborers across New Mexico.
Jonathan Meade said each aspect of the mural was carefully planned, but he wants members of the community to discern their own meaning behind the piece. Still, the mural speaks to more than just the planet’s recent global health crisis. Jonathan Meade said it also touches on communal healing.
“The hope is to speak to this coming together of the diversity of our society through the symbolism of embracing the diversity of the natural world,” Jonathan Meade said.
“And embracing creative expression,” Rapp added.
It hasn’t all gone smoothly, however. Jonathan Meade said a vandal spraypainted over the mural after their seventh day of work. Covering the graffiti with primer and paint pushed the work back about a day, but the group took the setback “in stride.”
“We thought it was so silly,” Jonathan Meade said. “We were like, ‘We can make something positive of this.’ ”
On Thursday, as the muralists discussed their work, Jesse Campbell, a Santa Fe police officer who patrols the area, stopped to admire the mural’s progress and expressed his frustration when he saw someone had defaced it.
“I was really annoyed that someone tagged on your building here,” Campbell said to the muralists. “I was really disappointed. But I just wanted to say you guys are going a great job.”
Rapp said the graffiti sparked a discussion on the loss of creative outlets for Santa Fe youth such as Warehouse 21, which left its Railyard space in 2019.
“What was that message on a deeper level?” Rapp said. “To us, it was like a cry out. We need more areas of creative expression.”
The creative expression aspect is something that All Aboard Earth hopes to dive into more in the coming months.
Michael Meade, the group’s education and music director, said they are ironing out an online environmental education curriculum that they hope to bring to elementary school classrooms. The curriculum would blend various art forms with topics such as water use, renewable energy, recycling, sustainable material usage, city building development and other conservation efforts.
“That’s a big aim for us,” Michael Meade said. “To instill in kids an [appreciation] and love for nature. We’re doing that through art and beauty and music.”
Michael Meade said Rapp’s experience as an art therapist is also a vital part of developing the curriculum.
The group hopes to launch a coloring book and puzzle based on the mural through its website, which would also feature details on the symbolism of the design.