City expanding public mural program

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on September 13, 2023.

Herald photo by Alejandra Pulido-Guzman Allied Arts Council executive director Jana MacKenzie, standing in front of a mural at Sisters Pub & Grill, says the AAC is accepting applications from local artists and business owners to beautify the city with murals.

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

The City of Lethbridge Public Art Program is seeking Expressions of Interest from building owners and artists throughout Lethbridge that are interested in installing a mural on a high-visibility exterior wall across the city.

Executive Director of the Allied Arts Council of Lethbridge, Jana MacKenzie spoke to the Herald Tuesday and said the AAC has been hired to do the administration part of the program to make sure things flow in the right direction, but the program itself is fully funded by the City of Lethbridge.

She said the program is basically an expansion of a previous program that run within the downtown area, to now include the entire city.

“2021 was the first year of the inaugural mural program, so we put a call out then to business and artists and it was focused mostly on the downtown core and from that we got six murals painted,” said MacKenzie.

She said the program was very successful from both perspectives as business owners were able to beautify their buildings and artists had the opportunity to display their art on highly visible spaces.

“Because of the success of that we’ve brought it back, but we’ve extended it to the whole city,” said MacKenzie.

She said there are some parameters the buildings need to meet, including the wall designated for the mural should not need too much work to be done to it prior to painting.

“The wall has to be visible to the public and can’t require too much fixing up. Some walls need a lot of work so we can’t do some of that because it increases the cost,” said MacKenzie.

Other criteria that must be met is that murals should reflect at least one of the guiding principles of the Public Art Master Plan which are Inclusivity, Diversity, Accessibility, Creativity, Sustainability, and Quality.

“We’re looking for any artist, whether you’ve done a mural or not. I think that is the exciting part, even if you’re not a painter, murals are accessible to you too,” said MacKenzie.

She said that as far as the budget goes, they have ranged from about $5,000 to $15,000 depending on the wall and the scope of the piece.

“The artist doesn’t have to come up with a design right away, they just have to show that they are interested and give us a bit of background of what work they’ve done before, and then we can work with them further if selected,” said MacKenzie.

She said last time some artists did not have the opportunity to create murals because they did not have enough walls to put them on across downtown, but she hopes they can re-apply now that the program has expanded to the entire city.

MacKenzie said that even though the program is for business owners, any organization, charity or non-profit that either owns the building they are in, or have permission from the owner prior to applying, are able to do so.

“The owner of the building would have to be part of the application because we’ve had rentals say they’re interested but then it just delays the process because the building owner is not actually interested those just didn’t go anywhere, so we really want up front permission,” said MacKenzie.

Applications are now open, and the deadline is Oct. 31.

 “If you’re not sure or you have questions, we are doing a free mural panel event during Arts Days on Sept. 23 at 3 p.m. at Casa in the community room, and we’re going to have the artist that did the previous murals on a panel to discuss their work and to answer any questions that folks might have,” said MacKenzie.

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