In Providence, art is prolific and greatly appreciated. Home to institutions like RISD and WaterFire, the city isn’t named the Creative Capital for nothing. Art is everywhere in Providence. Take a walk around downtown and you’ll find a slough of larger-than-life murals and photos. In 2010, renowned artists like RISD alumnus Shephard Fairey ushered in a new era of narrative street art. His colorful mural captured his highly personal experience in Providence after living in the city for years. Since then, the street art landscape has evolved and changed. This new art aims to bring a new level of awareness to the cultural landscape of our city.
Probably one of the most recognizable pieces of street art in Providence is Gaia’s Still Here. The portrait of Lynsea Montanari, a young Narragansett woman, looms large over the cityscape on Weybosset Street. When international artist Gaia was approached by The Avenue Concept to produce a mural for the city, the artist decided to focus on the idea of erasure. His work brings the contemporary Native American experience to the forefront of public consciousness today while harkening back to an unjust history.
“When we talk about the preservation of a city, we generally tend to focus on sort of the white European history, and we very often neglect the longer history, which involves indigenous people,” says Nick Platzer, 2D Art Director and Mural Program Manager at The Avenue Concept. All too often, Nick laments, the general public only gets one side of the story. Painting a portrait of Lynsea was a chance to change the narrative.
Gaia’s concept required extensive research and conversations with the Native American tribes here in Rhode Island about what would be included in the depiction. Both the artist and The Avenue Concept wanted to ensure that the mural accurately represented the locl indigenous community, and Lynsea was their guide. Take a look at Still Here and you’ll find strawberries, deer, flowers, and birds that are culturally significant to the Narragansett and Wampanoag tribes. In the portrait, Lynsea is also holding a smaller photo of Princess Red Wing, founder of the Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum in Exeter and vociferous indigenous rights activist. The actual placement of the mural itself is also meaningful. According to Nick, Weybosset Street is the only curved throughway in the area because the road follows an old trail that led to a Native American trading post down by the river; Still Here now sits at almost that exact location.
Too often, Nick says, the indigenous story portrayed in art is one of violence, bloodshed, and heartbreak. However, Gaia’s art exists to push back against this, becoming a symbol of resiliency. Says Nick, “Through all the stuff that we did, this community is still here, and it’s extremely strong.” Lynsea’s clothing in the work exemplifies this: You’ll notice that her garb is not traditional, but rather everyday street clothes. Nick says that this was done on purpose to let people know how Native Americans dress today, that they are still, indeed in our communities.
Take a drive up Cypress Street off of North Main in Mount Hope, and you’ll pass it – a large mural of several African American musicians ensconced in a sepia-toned palette, superimposed on a black record and a map of the surrounding area. Upon further inspection, you may recognize some of the faces on the mural – Ray Charles, Etta James, James Brown, Sarah Vaughn, and Billie Holiday – and some you may not. Each have a significance to the Mount Hope community.
The Mount Hope area has slowly gentrified. As white collar professionals spill over from Boston, the original neighborhood’s populations have been pushed to the fringes of the city. Mount Hope, a historically black neighborhood, has gradually shifted from a majority-black residential area to increasingly white. The mural, officially titled Stories of Mt. Hope: East Side Mural Project, is a response to this change. It seeks to remind community members, old and new, of the neighborhood’s black culture, history, and a community that doesn’t want to be forgotten.
Hannah Resseger, artistic director of the project says, “Bringing that history and that culture to the new generation…[we are] keeping that history alive for the people that are living there now, so that, when they see they know that this was here, this happened, and the people and the community were a big part of it...That culture was here and it’s so important.”
Amidst the familiar faces on the Cypress Street mural, you’ll also find local Mount Hope artists who “made it big.” The artist on the project, Elijah Faris, depicts Sisirretta Jones at the center of the work. Sisirretta, a soprano opera singer from College Hill, was the first black woman to perform at Carnegie Hall. Other native Mount Hopers include Billy Osborne, a talented drummer who played with noted jazz pioneer John Coltrane and later wrote songs for Ray Charles. There’s also David Hector, a saxaphone player who played with music big wigs like Etta James and James Brown. And finally, Sammy Hector (David’s son), otherwise known as DJ Leggs who “started breakin’” in the 90’s and DJing in the early 2000s makes an appearance on the wall as well.
The mural reminds people of Mount Hope’s historic past, but it also stands as a work of aspiration and positive representation. Hannah says the project lets members of the black community know that success is possible in Rhode Island, and they can follow in the footsteps of great musicians who came from their community.
“Rhode Island is relevant. We’re so left out of the big music scene, we kind of got skipped over. Like New York is big, Boston is big. It’s like, people think you have to leave Rhode Island to make it big, and a lot of times that’s true, but here you have a family that did make it big.”
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