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Today a blank wall… tomorrow? Owner prepares building for mural
by Gail Olson
Northeast’s Holland neighborhood might soon be the site of a new Dutch Master Mural, if a proposed art and education plan is successful.
Resident Mark Lynch, who said some of his ancestors were Dutch, is a fervent Vermeer fan: Vermeer being Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675), a Dutch Master whose oil paintings hang in such world-renowned museums as the Lourve. One Vermeer, “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” gained recent fame after being featured in a novel and 2003 movie, “Girl with a Pearl Earring,” staring Scarlett Johansson.
Lynch owns two buildings next to each other on Fourth Street NE. He lives in one, 2408 4th St. NE, and hasn’t decided what to do with the other one yet; it is a nondescript structure at 2406 4th St. NE, that in a previous life was a small store. It’s south-facing wall (which faces 24th Avenue) is blank, with no windows; perfect, Lynch thought, for a mural. And, considering his passion for Vermeer, he though a mural might be a good way to educate the Northeast community about his favorite artist, who happened to be from Holland.
“When I moved here, I didn’t know there was a neighborhood called Holland. I started going to [Holland Neighborhood Improvement Association, or HNIA] neighborhood meetings and talking to [executive director] Kevin [Reich]. He knew some muralists, Hans and Shannon Schumacher, who live in Northeast. Everyone I’ve talked to seems open to the idea.”
The neighborhood group, he added, has agreed to fund some of the artists’ costs. The Schumacher’s company, Specialty Finishes, specializes in artistic rendering and decorative wall finishes, according to their biography. Their work appears in the movies “A Prairie Home Companion” and “A Serious Man,” and they have installed pieces in private homes around the U.S.
The Vermeer painting Lynch picked for replication on his wall is called “The Little Street,” which hangs in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. It portrays a cobblestone street with two houses, a gate, and a passageway. Women are working and children playing in front of the houses. Lynch has been told that because it is so old and in the public domain, it wouldn’t be a copyright infringement if an artist copied it.
Lynch said he and the neighborhood group have talked about ways to whip up some interest in the project and add an educational component. Ideas so far have included children’s art activities; a discussion between teenagers. led by a Northeast librarian, of “Girl with a Pearl Earring” fiction novel by Tracy Chevalier; and a book discussion led by Lynch and another Holland neighborhood resident, Larry Pinkney, of “The Forger’s Spell,” by Edward Dolnick. The book is about a man who painted fake Vermeers during World War II and sold them for millions of dollars. His customers included Nazi Hermann Goering.
Lynch said that he had already started the ball rolling on his mural idea when he found out that the Minneapolis Institute of Art will be showing Vermeer’s famous painting, “The Astronomer,” from Oct. 18 through Jan. 10.
“That just made it feel like the stars are aligned on this project,” he said. “We are hoping to have the mural finished by the time the painting comes to Minneapolis.”
Lynch said that he doesn’t yet know what the muralists will charge for their work. They are submitting a proposal. “I’m asking everybody to submit a budget - the cement people, the carpenter. There’s some work that needs to be done on the building. It hasn’t been used since 1980. The muralists suggested putting the mural on the south wall and painting around the front.
“I see myself as promoting the idea, but I want to involve as many people as possible. We should have public art in an arts district. Hopefully, this will spur other people to do a mural.”
Aaron Neumann, HNIA outreach coordinator, says he likes the idea. “I’ve become much more interested in Vermeer since this project started,” he added.
He said he has read “The Forger’s Spell,” and found it fascinating. “They weren’t even good paintings. He [artist Hans van Meegeren] wasn’t copying anything Vermeer had done; they weren’t imitations. He was painting entirely different paintings.”
(According to Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia, van Meegeren was about to be imprisoned for selling Duth cultural property to the Nazis when he finally admitted they were his own work.)
The neighborhood group and Lynch will contribute to the mural’s cost.
“It’s a good project for the community, and it will help clean up the building, which does need some work. I think it’s very fitting that we’re able to use local artists,” Neumann said.
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