Evanston community members came together to brainstorm their ideal Main Street mural at Open Studio Project’s third community workshop Saturday. 

OSP is a nonprofit focused on promoting community wellbeing through the arts. With the help of the Cook County Arts Placemaking Grant, OSP launched a project to paint a three-story mural at 727 Main St. with the aim of “reinvigorating” the neighborhood, OSP Executive Director Rob Lentz said. 

The wall currently features a faded mural which was painted by Nichols Middle School students 33 years ago. 

“It’s important to me to feel that this will be a really friendly and welcoming artwork that will make people feel comfortable and happy and inspired to come to this place,” said OSP Board President and Facilitator Ted Harris.

As part of the workshops, local residents sketch out potential mural designs at OSP’s art studio on Sherman Avenue. While the sketches varied, many embraced the motif of water to represent Lake Michigan and vivid colors to showcase the “vibrant community,” Harris said. 

Community members can further share their insights on the design through an online survey. These inputs all serve as a source of inspiration for the project’s creative team, which consists of Oscar Joyo, Xavier Wynn and Edwige Massart. The mural will ultimately comprise a painting and a mosaic, Joyo said. 

The mosaic will incorporate some shards of the original mural that Lentz has collected over the years. Lentz said that the painting will make the mural visible from afar, whereas the mosaic will make it more tactile from closeby. 

“So we got a lot of the major beats, a lot of themes, a lot of storytelling into it,” Joyo said. “Now we’re just making sure things are as tangible as they possibly can be.”

Lentz stressed the importance of community engagement in the process of creating public art, especially as the neighborhood surrounding the mural has undergone significant changes since the COVID-19 pandemic, he said. 

OSP has undertaken similar initiatives in the past. In 2009, volunteers and artists completed a mural near the Chicago Transit Authority train station on Main Street. To create that mural, OSP Facilitator Jan Ellenstein said the organization hosted a workshop where participants worked on individual tiles which were then assembled to create a map of Evanston. 

Due to lack of maintenance, the wall on Main Street will first need to be resurfaced before the painting begins on the new mural, Lentz said. While progress will depend on the weather, Lentz hopes the mural will be completed by August. 

“Until there’s a visual, I think it’s not really real,” Lentz said. “So I’m excited that something is going to actually start happening.” 

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