First City Mural Fest

First City City Mural Fest

Inaugural Mural Fest Celebration Kicks off in Pensacola

By Morgan Cole

Nine local artists were recently selected to participate in a new public art project called the First City Mural Fest.

First City Mural Fest grew out of a convergence of people who are passionate about art and Pensacola. Three groups came together and decided that Pensacola ought to celebrate the murals that already exist in our community and add to the city’s as well. The first group included Pensacola leaders who launched ArtVenturePensacola.com, which includes an inventory of public art and its location within our community. While putting together this project, they discovered numerous beautiful murals to include. Around this time, the number of talented muralists in the city had also grown, so the muralists came together and formed the Pensacola Muralists group. “During the launch of ArtVenture Pensacola, we found that Pensacola is home to a fantastic variety of murals and that we have an active Pensacola Muralists Society right here in our city,” Founder of ArtVenture Pensacola, Holly Benson said. After garnering support from the local community, a number of business owners in Pensacola’s historic Tanyard Neighborhood had also decided to invest in some beautiful murals for their buildings. These groups met and the creative sparks flew. From there, the idea for the First City Mural Fest came to life. During its pilot program phase, it will be working under the umbrella of the First City Arts Center. In late September the First City Mural Fest released its Request for Qualifications (RFQ) for its pilot mural celebration to be held November 5 at Emerald Republic Brewing Company at 1414 West Government Street in downtown Pensacola. During the two-week RFQ period, local muralists were invited to submit their concepts and work samples that went along with the mural fest submission theme of “Pensacola’s Hidden Treasures.” “We had some really great responses and wanted to make sure that the theme harnesses something other than the standard symbols or icons of Pensacola, but something that these artists have found that makes this city really special to them, so there was a very wide range in the types of submissions received and it’s nice to discover, again, all of the reasons people love this community,” Benson explained.

For the first pilot mural celebration, the panel of First City Mural Fest jurors selected a total of nine local muralists from the Pensacola area to paint panels at Emerald Republic on November 5. “We had a total of about 26 submissions from local artists and muralists interested in participating in this new pilot program. If you look at other cities who do mural festivals, you can see that this is something that really adds to a city’s overall quality of public art, and we have a lot of amazing public art here. We also have so many talented muralists, so we wanted to find a way to bring quality murals to the walls of Pensacola,” Benson said. Mural festivals have become an annual event in many larger cities around the world, attracting both talented artists and tourists. Daniela de Castro Sucre is one of the local artists heavily involved in helping to launch this inaugural mural fest event and will also be participating as one of the muralists. “We wanted to create a street art and mural-focused event that celebrates local artists and our beautiful city,” de Castro Sucre said. “We want to showcase Pensacola’s talented artists, and invite locals to experience a brand new art festival,” We’re launching a one-day teaser event this year, with the hopes of extending it to a week-long event in years to come, inviting top global mural artists to paint our city and creating community events alongside the festival.” On November 5 at 10 am, members of the community are invited to come and view the live painting of these mural panels at Emerald Republic in downtown Pensacola. The nine selected muralists will be painting from 10 am until 6 pm that evening. There will also be a silent auction held in which the painted panels will be auctioned off to raise funds for the First City Mural Fest. “We have been pleased to see the number of murals in our neighborhood growing and are happy to be a part of this event,” Josh Copper, Taproom Manager for Emerald Republic said. For more information on the First City Mural Fest and details on this year’s participating artists, visit firstcitymuralfest.com or email info@firstcitymuralfest.com.