In August, Michigan-based artist Jamie John was commissioned to paint a mural at the Gichigamiin Indigenous Nations Museum in Evanston. Less than a week later, they were fired and sent home with no reimbursement for travel expenses and no payment.
The freehand writing and symbols John had painted onto the wall to scale their mural were soon painted over, and John never got to finish his piece.
John’s project was not the only Evanston mural to disappear.
A controversial doodle grid
According to John, they were fired over the doodle grid they painted as a part of the mural process.
Doodle grid is a technique in which artists use symbols and letters to scale their murals, rather than using a traditional square grid. Artists usually leave them up for anywhere from 12 to 24 hours, and then paint them over with the mural. They are not seen in the final mural.
For the project, John had painted words and symbols related to the Israel-Hamas war as a part of their doodle grid, leaving them up overnight. The grid featured images of animals and flowers, as well as words such as “Protect immigrants” and “Fund art, not weapons.”
The next morning, John received a phone call from the museum’s executive director, Kim Vigue, asking him to paint over the text immediately.
“She said that my messages were highly offensive to the surrounding community, that I was to cover everything up immediately, that she didn’t care if it was in primer or if it was in colors, but that it needed to be covered up immediately,” John said.
While working on the next steps for the mural later that afternoon, John was informed that his contract had been terminated by another museum staffer. By 4 p.m., the museum had posted a statement on Instagram, describing the doodle grid as “unauthorized visuals.”
Ultimately, the doodle grid had not been approved by the museum and did not reflect its mission of “elevating Native voices,” according to an Aug. 6 post on its Facebook.
John had completed similar doodle grids with other institutions, and they had assumed that the museum staffers were aware of his previous projects, they said.
“It is meant to be a reflection of thoughts and current goings-on in the world. While the final mural image may not speak to our current political realities, there is the undercurrent and the underpainting that does,” John said.
For him, doodle grids are always a part of the artistic process, even if they aren’t visible in the final product.
John said doodle grids are a reflection of the artist’s personal thoughts about the world, while the final commissioned mural sometimes differs.
“What I can do with those words is speak something that is true to power, that is against the systems that would rather not see public art out and about. These systems that fundamentally still do hurt artists,” John said. “This is my mural. If you wanted a muralist and an artist that was fine with genocide going on or was willing to excuse Zionism, then get a different one.”
Protesting with chalk
Chicago-area artist Kandi Jamieson created a series of chalk murals throughout the city, which included political messaging surrounding the Israel-Hamas war, last summer. She was not hired and did not attempt to obtain city approval for the project, because she said she believes public art should “go against the grain.”
After her first installation, the murals were painted over by city workers. This disheartened Jamieson because of the washable nature of her medium: chalk.
“The city is choosing who is able to have power in politics, and we, the people, should have the power,” Jamieson said. “I knew that it would be painted over, but having this history within the dialogue of art-making in the streets is what’s important.”
For Jamieson, she said it feels like Evanston is in a “bubble” and “likes to sweep harder conversations under the rug.”
“But there are (a) handful of us, people that would rather actually talk about these more difficult conversations,” she added.
Jamieson chose to use chalk for the project because it was washable and temporary, she said. She also described her chosen medium as “kid-friendly” and “rooted in play.”
Ultimately, though, the city removed the mural because it lacked proper approval, according to Public Art Working Group chair Raissa Bailey. She said there is a key distinction between graffiti and public art. To be considered public art, a piece must go through the appropriate channels of approval, such as permission from the building owner.
This Public Art Working Group operates under the Evanston Arts Council, which was established by a bylaw in the city code and granted authority over public art in the city.
However, the relationship between the city and the arts council is complex, and the council was not consulted in the removal of these murals, according to former Arts Council chair James Deeb.
“We basically said to our counterparts at the city that those kind of controversies should come to us first,” Deeb said. “They sidestepped the Arts Council in that situation, because I think it actually required a bit more sensitive handling than what the city actually did.”
In a statement to The Daily, Evanston’s Communications and Community Engagement Manager Cynthia Vargas said that the city received a call about the drawing into its 311 service hotline, which is a call center and online resident support center for residents to voice issues. Because the drawing was unsanctioned, she said, the city was obligated to remove it.
In order to promote freedom of expression, the Public Art Working Group and the City of Evanston are currently working on a project called the Permission Wall.
This wall was inspired by the desire for a space for artists to express themselves without having to go through an extensive approval process, Bailey said. There are still some parameters on what you can put on this wall, Deeb said, including no gang symbols, sexually explicit words or hate speech.
“It is sanctioned as a space for people to come and just express themselves, artistically, creatively in some manner,” Bailey said. “There’s room for both, but it’s just doing it in a way that’s both respectful of property and the community.
Redesigning ‘Resolved’
In 2022, a mural by artist and graphic designer Ben Blount was unveiled at 600 Washington St., near the Chicago Transit Authority Main Street stop in Evanston. The mural features white text against a black background, displaying language from a 2019 Evanston resolution that publicly committed the city to promoting racial equity.
However, that text was not a part of the original design.
Originally, Blount wanted the mural to simply say “Black Lives Matter,” but CTA representatives did not give explicit approval, so he felt uncomfortable moving forward with that design.
“I think there was a question of equal access and equal opportunity. So if there was a Black Lives Matter mural, there might be another mural that had the opposite saying that they would also have to approve,” Blount said.
Blount said he could have continued with his original vision, even without explicit approval. The message was relayed to him by a representative from the City of Chicago, who did not say the original design would be taken down. Blount ultimately decided it would be best to go in another direction, though, he said.
Still, Blount said he ended up being happy with his vision for the project because the new design had a more direct connection to Evanston. He added that the new design felt less directly tied to a certain time period or movement.
“We could have moved on without it, but I know I wanted the mural to be something that we were happy about, and that would be up and not have to be changed for some political reasons in the future,” Blount said.
Preserving history on Main Street
Rob Lentz has a bucket of mural fragments in his office.
About 40 years ago, students at Nichols Middle School painted a mural on a wall facing an Evanston parking lot. The mural covered a building that would later become Open Studio Project, the art wellbeing organization for which Lentz is the executive director.
Today, the mural stands in disarray, slowly crumbling and fading.
Since Lentz was hired at Open Studio Project four years ago, he has searched for a way to restore the mural.
In July 2025, Cook County came out with a placemaking grant, aimed at making neighborhoods inviting and more culturally vibrant. With the help of this grant, Open Studio Project is now planning a new mural for the wall, and the design will be based on a survey sent out to the community. Lentz hopes that through this project, the team can create something that represents the spirit of the neighborhood, he said.
“The great thing about this neighborhood is there is kind of everything,” Lentz said. “Almost all of the businesses in this area are independently owned, which is awesome. So people have a real connection to the community in that way. And I think people seek out businesses like that.”
However, to create the new mural, the old one must be destroyed. The layer of brick that the current mural is painted on will be removed and replaced with a new one, due to its deteriorating condition.
To preserve its history, Lentz hopes to incorporate some of the old mural fragments into the mosaic design. He is also trying to track down the students and teachers who worked on the original project.
Former art teacher Maggie Revel Mielczarek worked on a similar project in the early 2000s at nearby Washington Elementary School, where she helped create a series of murals after winning a $5,000 grant.
“We used students’ collages to come up with all the intricate designs that we used that were all sort of reminiscent of memories of Washington School,” Mielczarek said. “Every single person in the school, every single student in the school was able to have a hand in making it.”
Although the line between freedom of expression and city approval is still tense, artists like John still believe in the power of public art.
“I find that public art reflects community values in a way that museums and institutions often don’t.” John said, “And I really like public art because it’s a different way to invite people in.”
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