Written
THINGS TO DO
on the
walls
Anyone taking a self-guided tour of the Whaling City's largest murals and colorful examples of public art should start with the oldest "Dignity," which has graced a wall near the corner of Spring and South Sixth streets since 2001, is centered by a portrait of famed abolitionist (and one-time New Bedford resident) Frederick Douglass. The images around him depict the history of the labor movement and activism in New Bedford from the whaling and textile spinning mills days to the 20th century.
Each face on the mural depicts an actual laborer or a person involved in the labor movement. That's Arnold Dubin himself and the late Massachusetts Teachers Association activist and BCC teacher Margaret Rykebusch pictured in the top left corner. Gloria Clark of New Bedford is proud to note she was one of the volunteers who helped paint in some of the colors
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The "Dignity" mural featuring Frederick Douglass on South Sixth St., created by Dan Deveney, a noted Northern Irish mural painter, Conor McGrady, and other volunteers.
by Michael J. DeCicco in the mural, assisting the main artist, Dan Deveney, a noted Northern Irish mural painter, Conor McGrady, and other volunteers. She noted the mural has been restored professionally twice under the auspices of the UMass Dartmouth Labor Education Center directed by Kim Wilson. "The mural was conceived by a group of union and community activists and leaders to give a beautiful piece of art to the community," Wilson elaborated. "We wanted to stress the many other movements Douglass was connected to. Part of the commitment to our major funder, Mass Humanities, was to ensure that it is preserved. Twice in the past 20 years we have brought a mural restoration specialist here to replace cracking paint, etc. "Murals like this one don't last forever unless you do restoration work," Clark added. "Paint peels on a solid wall like this. Weather cracks it."
October 2021 | The South Coast Insider
"Murals like this one don't last forever unless you do restoration work. Paint peels on a solid wall like this. Weather cracks it." Art explosion
But since the debut of “Dignity” in 2001, public art has only proliferated. The mural honoring the Civil War's famed 54th Regiment, the AfricanAmerican regiment that recruited its soldiers in New Bedford, has covered a wall off of Williams Street on the Freestone's Restaurant building since 2017. The National Park Service commissioned Philadelphia artist Jared Badeer to create an illustration of the regiment's recruiting days in the Whaling City, which took place in a small
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