Squirrels in Architectural Frieze
Location: 112 South Tryon Street Architectural Frieze
Date: 1927
Media: Sandstone
Story: The First National Bank was built in 1927 and was the second tallest building in North Carolina when it was completed. Noted Charlotte architect Louis Asbury designed the building.
Key Formal Elements:
- Sculptural type - relief sculpture
- Notice the repetition of patterns and intricate decoration
Make the Connection:
The artists created a variety of designs for the ornamental carved sandstone. There are figures from nature and some references to classical figures or mythological figures. Three animals are central to the design. Can you find the beehive, the squirrel, and the owl? Can you relate the symbolic meanings of these animals to the original purpose of the building?
Beavers, Penguins in Plaza Midwood Mural
Location: 1516 Central Avenue wall of the Coultrane’s Char Grill
Artists: Matt Hooker, Matt Moore
Date: 2017
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @hookermedia, @puckmcgruff
Story: The artists celebrate the diversity and eclectic quality of the Plaza Midwood neighborhood with themes of fantasy, children, magic, and animals.
Key Formal Elements:
- Variety rules this post-modern collage
- Polychromatic color scheme
Make the Connection:
Can you make out the letters on the left of the mural and figure out what they spell? What is one object in the mural that relates to the theme of families and children? How is the idea of creativity or transformation expressed by the artists in the mural?
Cat Sculpture
Location: 514 E. 36th Street sculpture out front of Smelly Cat Coffee
Artist: Theron Ross
Date: 2011
Media: Metal
Artist Info: @theronross
Story: Playful sculpture in front of Smelly Cat Coffee House draws attention to the business and it is a bike rack that acts as a functional element of the streetscape. This project was a collaboration between NoDaRioty, the arts committee of the Historic North Charlotte Neighborhood Association and the Neighborhood Energy Challenge Grant. “Pimp my Rack” allowed Ross, a metal-worker and blacksmith, an opportunity to create six artistic bicycle rack designs. Five are still located in the neighborhood.
Key Formal Elements:
- Three-dimensional, free-standing sculpture
- Clever use of negative space
Make the Connection:
The sculpture was recently yarn bombed by fiber artist Jessica Allen @desertroseknittco. Yarn bombing is a type of graffiti or street art that uses colorful displays of knitted or crocheted yarn or fiber arts. Be on the lookout for other items that have been yarn bombed in NoDa.
Eagle Mural
Location: 510 E. 35th Street wall at 510 Expert Tattoos
Artist: Tom Michael
Date:
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @uglytom
Story: Large eagle with fully spread wings covers half of a side wall of the tattoo studio. Blue and white fluffy clouds fill in the rest of the areas.
Key Formal Elements:
- Implied motion of the bird in flight
- Asymmetrical balance with the focal point behind the eagle at the point where the red sunbursts begin
Make the Connection:
The eagle can be symbolic of many things in art. Going back to the founding of the United States, the eagle can be a symbol of power, courage, independence, and freedom. How does the choice of subject matter for this mural relate to the business?
Surreal Elephants Mural
Location: 3215 N. Davidson Street front wall of Stu’s Barrell Shop
Artist:
Date:
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info:
Story: Salvador Deli is the former business located in this building and the original commissioner of the mural. The name of the deli was a play on the name of famous Surrealist artist Salvador Dali. You can find the face of Dali, with his signature handlebar mustache, incorporated into each of the wine bottles on the upper part of the wall.
Key Formal Elements:
- Symmetrical balance created by the placement of elephants
- Warm colors of yellow, orange and red form the background
Make the Connection:
This mural is an appropriation of one of the more well-known Dali paintings. Dali challenges the usual view of elephants as symbols of strength and stability by giving them thin, spindly legs. This encourages the viewer to question our assumptions and enjoy the playful and illogical schemes of the Surrealist artists.
Fish Street Art
Location: Intersection of S. Mint Street at W. Park Avenue
Artist: Darion Fleming
Date: 2019
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @da.flemingo
Story: This project is a partnership between the City of Charlotte and Centralina Council of Governments for the OpenStreets704 biking celebration in Fall 2019. During the OpenStreets704 festival, the artist and members of the community painted this traffic calming street art. Darion Fleming is a local, talented artist who got his start designing cans of beer for local breweries. He quickly moved to a much larger scale designing walls for Catawba Brewery and Divine Barrel. With two major murals on the Plaza-Midwood ArtWalk, he explores subject matter of animals but with a twist. Here a fish makes another appearance but on the street.
Key Formal Elements:
- Outline used consistently
- Cool colors of the water and warm colors of the body of the fish
Make the Connection:
Traffic calming art? Yes, traffic calming art got its start in Portland, Oregon in the 1990s. The idea is that colorful street art will get driver’s attention, cause a momentary pause, and alert the driver to the area around them. Do you have an idea for traffic calming in your neighborhood? Great, the City of Charlotte has a “Paint the Pavement” program and you can apply through the Charlotte Placemaking Hub on the city’s website. What about the giant fish in a turning radius makes you want to slow down the car?
Eagle and the Chipmunk Mural
Location: 1530 Elizabeth Ave
Artist: Joey Obso
Date: 2018
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @joeyobso
Story: Local mural and graffiti artist Obso completed this mural for Talking Walls 2018. Talking Walls 2018 was the inaugural city-wide mural festival and it sponsored 16 new murals in locations all around Charlotte. Obso is known for his comic book style, magical and mysterious art, and his artistic partnerships. Here a large, menacing eagle with talons up dominates a clear blue background while sneakily, a spunky chipmunk gets ready to fight.
Key Formal Elements:
- Scale
- Implied motion
Make the Connection:
Here’s a short lesson in Graffiti 101. There are two main types of lettering styles in graffiti. Simples are bubble style letters or balloon style letters. Wild style lettering is a more complicated and intricate lettering style, even calligraphic. Usually highly stylized, with interlocking letters, it can be hard to read. Obso’s mural features “wild style” letters at the bottom of the composition. Can you figure out what it says? Tag @artwalksclt with your answer.
Wolf and the Deer at Lineberger Dentistry
Location: 347 N. Caswell Road
Artists: Matt Hooker, Matt Moore
Date: 2017
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @hookermedia, @puckmcgruff
Story: Lineberger Dentistry commissioned murals for their building and commissioned the dynamic duo of the Matts. The fourth out of five total murals is an image of a wolf and a deer.
Key Formal Elements:
- Value scale of greys in the animals
- Visual texture of fur
Make the Connection:
Sometimes artists have subject matters that appear more frequently than others. The wolf or wolf-like creature makes appearances often in the work of Matt Moore. While the cool color of blue unifies all of these five murals, the frontal view of the wild animals here is unique and more personal for the artists.
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Honeybee Mural at Flower Child
Location: 1537 Camden Road
Artist: Matthew Willey
Date: 2019
Media: Acrylic paint
Artist Info: @thegoodofthehive
Story: Asheville-based artist Matthew Willey painted this mural on the light rail facing side of Flower Child. This mural is part of his For the Good of the Hive initiative which seeks to create awareness about the importance of honey bees to our collective planetary health.
Key Formal Elements:
- Organic Shapes
- Implied motion
Make the Connection:
Willey is on a quest to paint 50,000 honey bees. 50,000 is the number of bees required to maintain a healthy hive. Willey started this act of gentle activism five years ago and he has painted over 5,000 bees so far. How has our connection to nature been represented by other art that you’ve seen in South End?