Here’s a riddle for you:
What’s 36 feet wide, eight feet tall and black and white and red and green and blue and orange and yellow and purple and brown and….well, you get the idea…all over?
Here’s the answer:
“Harmony on the Vine: Spill Paint Not Blood." It's a massive, nine panel mural that will be unveiled at 6 p.m. Friday in the 18th and Vine District.
The project started three months ago.
Now, after hundreds of hours of work by more than 750 artists from all over the world, it is ready to be viewed and experienced.
By the way, some of those “artists” never knew they had it in them.
Just regular folks took brush in hand to be part of this community “hug.”
According to Cheptoo Kositany-Buckner, executive director of the American Jazz Museum, this project makes a “visible connection between jazz and the community-an oasis of peace and cooperation in a world too often violent and divided.”
Although this is truly a group effort, Michael Toombs, is the guiding light. He can’t wait for the world to see this amazing effort.
Toombs even let a TV guy paint a piece of the vine and leave his name behind.
There are lots of familiar sites, names and faces on the mural.
And, one face has special meaning.
Karen E. Griffin does community outreach for the Jazz Museum and grew up in the 18th and Vine neighborhood.
Now, Griffin is part of the mural. Her welcoming face immortalized for generations to come.
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Joel Nichols can be reached at joel.nichols@kclive.tv.
