AURORA | People passing through the Aurora Cultural Arts District will soon see a colossal representation of another famous “Aurora.”
A blend of municipal and private agencies announced the commission of a massive new mural in the heart of the ACAD on June 12, inspired by the natural light display aurora borealis.
The public art project is being splashed on a blank, eight-story slab of stone on the north side of the Fletcher Gardens apartments just off of East Colfax Avenue on Emporia Street. It’s meant to act as a loud, visual reminder to visitors that they are, in fact, within a bohemian hive filled with creative verve, according to Tracy Weil, managing director of the ACAD.
Weil said that several Aurora lever-pullers and creatives had a hand in commissioning the mural, the planning process for which began in February.
“Our board president, Bob Hagedorn, always thought that it would be good to have a mural on that building because it would serve as sort of a beacon for the district,” Weil said. “Then we kind of ran across (Aurora Poet Laureate) Jovan Mays’ poem about the (aurora) borealis, and that’s what kind of what started the idea.”
The creation was commissioned for $25,000 and paid for by Aurora’s Art in Public Places Program.
Artists Michael Ortiz and Jonathan Lamb, co-owners of Denver-based public art firm Like Minded Productions, will be spearheading the project.
“We’re thrilled to have them working in A-Town,” Weil said in a statement. “Their work is stellar and is a proven catalyst in transforming communities.”
Ortiz and Lamb co-founded their artistic firm in Denver’s RiNo Art District — which Weil helped found over a decade ago — in 2007 and have since designed projects across the metro region, Colorado and the world. Prior to beginning the new Aurora mural, the Like Minded duo painted the Bob Marley Family Studio in Kingston, Jamaica.
“We’ve seen muraling (sic) spur economic and cultural development in blighted urban neighborhoods around the country,” Lamb said in a statement. “We want to use art as a statement to influence new development coming into the metro area, and we want to continue to bring national and international talent here to contribute.”
The ACAD’s newest display could be one of many in the coming years. Last year, Weil and other ACAD officials identified about 50 blank walls across the district primed for more murals in the future.
Work on the mural began June 20 and the project is slated to be completed by Aug. 1. Ortiz and Lamb will be working on the piece throughout the Aurora Arts Festival on June 27, allowing the public to catch a peek of the work in progress.