Bird Mural in Downtown Oakland
By Pam Consear
Downtown Oakland has a new mural! Actually, most of a city block full of murals, emblazoned with flying herons and egrets and post office-related paraphernalia (which I’ll explain later).
I was honored to be hired as the lead artist on this mural project. Here’s how it all came about:
In 2015 I painted a series of vintage-style postcard murals on three separate buildings in Oakland’s Dimond District. The postcards—which are permanent installations; go have a look!—come in pairs, with a “front side” picture that highlights a special feature of the neighborhood, and a “back side” that includes a postage stamp, address, postmark, and a handwritten message from the community. Those murals caught the attention of Raymond Connell, Development Manager at Holland Partner Group. Ray appreciated the friendly, whimsical, and informative nature of the artwork.
In 2017, HPG was making plans to build an apartment complex on the formerly barren parking lot at 14th & Alice Streets, where families of snowy egrets and black-crowned night herons had been nesting for years. As many locals are aware, these winged residents have been both beloved by, and a nuisance to, the human residents and workers in the area. And their living conditions present many hazards for the birds themselves—especially for the youngest members of the flocks.
Ray deserves credit for many things, including working with Golden Gate Bird Alliance to help safely relocate the birds, and reaching out to me to help convey a visual message to the surrounding community. He and his associate at the time, Jacqueline Morrone, approached me about creating postcard-style murals that would be written “from the birds” to inform their downtown neighbors about the new homes that were being prepared for them at Lake Merritt.
Besides just the pair of postcards, however, Ray and Jackie asked me to come up with a way to embellish all of the 8-foot-high plywood construction fencing that would surround three sides of the city block between 13th and 14th Streets, and Alice and Jackson Streets.
Artist Lindsey Kernodle, and former GGBA intern, created playful, pun-filled images of members of the bird families. We thought her work would look great styled as Polaroids—a set of (bird) family photos to let the neighbors know how the kids were doing, so to speak.
My design solution for this enormous expanse of wall involved three components:
- Positioning the postcards as the mural’s anchor and information hub. We decided to install them near the bus stop on 14th Street at Jackson, for maximum visibility. And you know how postcards have a lot of fine print on the back? I used that design element to convey information about the birds (including a Chinese translation) and about the project’s collaborating partners.
- Placing Lindsey’s designs at various angles and intervals along the three sides of the block. A total of 20 copies of her designs were printed onto corrugated plastic poster boards for this purpose. They provide artistic interest, humor, and visual consistency around the block.
Lindsey’s “Polaroids” by Cindy Margulis - Linking the postcards and the posters with light-hearted sketched artwork painted directly onto the plywood fencing. I made loose, curvy, colorful lines and swirls all along the walls, interspersed with simple drawings of a variety of winged objects, both birds and post-office artifacts. Why paper airplanes, flying envelopes, and mailboxes with wings, you ask? Because of the postcard theme (where this whole project began), and because the location is across the street from the big post office.
In advance of the installation dates, I requested that the construction crew paint the entire length of plywood fencing a sky blue color. You know—because of all the flying things!
One tricky piece of this project was… the real live birds. Despite the best efforts of humans to safely transition them to a much more suitable home, they just didn’t seem to want to move. So we waited and waited and eventually reworded the postcard’s handwritten message several times, to reflect the actual situation (“homes have been prepared”), rather than the desired one (“We love our new home at the lake!”).
It should perhaps be noted that, after 20 years living in Oakland, last year I moved to Portland, Oregon. No matter! I was able to paint the postcards on 3-foot by 5-foot cement board panels at home, and then transport them by car to the mural site. It gave me a great excuse to visit long-time friends and mural buddies.
Prior to the road trip, I notified my list of potential Bay Area mural volunteers of the dates I’d be working at the walls: November 28, 29 and 30. And I kept an eye on weather reports: Would the smoky air be breathable? (Yes!) Would the forecasted rain mess with our plans? (Yes! But only partially.)
Ultimately the weather cooperated exactly enough, and I was able to conjure up just the right number of volunteers to finish the installation in three partly rainy days. As we were close to wrapping up, Ray came by to take photos, Kristin Hall (also from HPG) put paintbrush to wall, and Cindy Margulis from Golden Gate Bird Alliance used her aviary acumen to blacken the egrets’ toenails and redden the herons’ eyes. Now many things (some of them anatomically correct) fly amid colorful swirly lines, along three sides of that city block at 14th & Alice Streets.
The construction fencing, and the mural work that covers it, is anticipated to be in place for just over a year. When it comes down, the postcard panels and Polaroid posters will be donated to Golden Gate Bird Alliance.
Projects like this give me great pleasure. It’s a joy to collaborate with friendly and reliable partners. I learned a lot about these two bird species through researching and drawing them in many positions and stages of life. Painting the panels in my Portland dining room was quiet and meditative. And it’s always fun, while working on site, to field questions from people walking by, and to hear thank-yous and congratulations shouted from passing car windows. I’m fortunate to do work that builds my creative skills while enhancing public spaces.
Pam Consear is a visual artist and writer based in Portland, Oregon. She previously lived in Oakland, where she led over 4,000 volunteers in the creation of more than 50 community mosaic and painted mural projects. She encourages every kind of person to get their hands messy with art supplies. Find out more about her work at www.AllHandsArt.com.
To sign the petition to make the Black-crowned Night-Heron the official bird of Oakland go to https://www.change.org/p/black-crowned-night-heron-for-the-official-bird-of-oakland
To learn more about Golden Gate Bird Alliance’s efforts to relocate the Oakland herons, check out this video.
and a few of these past blogs
https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/blog-posts/oakland-saves-herons-removing-tree/