{"id":9393,"date":"2021-05-28T17:50:13","date_gmt":"2021-05-28T17:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/2022\/01\/25\/mayx-snapshot-public-art-goes-up-against-the-wall\/"},"modified":"2024-07-26T08:59:04","modified_gmt":"2024-07-26T12:59:04","slug":"mayx-snapshot-public-art-goes-up-against-the-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/mayx-snapshot-public-art-goes-up-against-the-wall\/","title":{"rendered":"MayX Snapshot: Public art goes up against the wall"},"content":{"rendered":"

Each day this week, we\u2019re highlighting a course from <\/em>May Experience<\/em><\/a> \u2013 a chance for students to explore topics beyond the typical academic year.<\/em><\/p>\n

COURSE:<\/strong> Art and Community Engagement
\nINSTRUCTOR:<\/strong> Ross McClain, chair of the art department
\nOBJECTIVE: <\/strong>Encourage creative research, design and practice outside the gallery setting, and explore public art in its many manifestations.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When Ross McClain looks at a wall, he\u2019s silently judging it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to get high visibility,\u201d says the art professor. \u201cThere are some walls that are too tucked away. And some are really complicated. The bricks can be very deep-grooved, and that would be very challenging to deal with.\u201d<\/p>\n

He\u2019s hoping his MayX students will begin to think the same way after spending the month painting a mural on the side of D\u2019Allesandro\u2019s Pizza<\/a> near downtown Greenville. The artists \u2013 some of whom have never picked up a brush before, McClain says \u2013 aren’t just learning how to put paint on brick; they\u2019re also awakening dormant creativity.<\/p>\n

\"A

Part of the MayX art mural project in downtown Greenville.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThe whole mission of our department has been about reengaging students,\u201d McClain says. \u201cA lot of times, students feel like art is a frivolous waste of time. And as a result, they\u2019re hesitant to embrace their creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n

By painting in a public place right off heavily trafficked Wade Hampton Boulevard, the students are also discovering how art can provoke conversations.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople come up and start to talk with them,\u201d McClain says. \u201cThey learn a lot about what\u2019s going on in people\u2019s lives and the impact that what they\u2019re doing has in the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

The young artists are also coming away with valuable lessons in organization and collaboration. There are multiple partnerships behind each MayX mural, McClain says \u2013 including with property owners, local artists and Pepsi of Greenville<\/a>.<\/p>\n

McClain\u2019s classes have decorated many of the Upstate\u2019s blank walls through the years, including a few in Greenville’s Stone Avenue area and one in Travelers Rest. For each mural, a local artist \u2013 this year, it was Matteo Miles<\/a> \u2013 outlines the initial design on the wall. The students then fill it in, essentially \u201cpainting by numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n

To honor Pepsi\u2019s sponsorship and support, many of the murals prominently feature vintage Pepsi products and logos. The D\u2019Allesandro\u2019s mural shows a Pepsi bottle spewing out, next to a Dali-esque pizza slice melting over Greenville\u2019s iconic Liberty Bridge.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an intriguing time to study public art, McClain says, especially given the recent controversy over several \u201cWings of Greenville\u201d sculptures placed downtown.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it\u2019s in the public space, people have to engage with it,\u201d he says. \u201cThey can\u2019t really move away from it. And people feel like they have ownership of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

What McClain hopes his students take away, however, is that public art is essential to the soul of a community.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt gives a sense of identity and representation of the ethos of a campus or even a city,\u201d he says. \u201cIt is a representation of all of us. And it should be a celebration \u2013 and it should challenge us to go in directions that we feel like we need to go.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Each day this week, we\u2019re highlighting a course from May Experience \u2013 a chance for students to explore topics beyond the typical academic year. COURSE: Art and Community Engagement INSTRUCTOR: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":265,"featured_media":33387,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-department-page","category-may-experience"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/265"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9393"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33388,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9393\/revisions\/33388"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}