$40,000 Library Mural Misspells Names

Yahoo | October 7, 2004 | AP

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

LIVERMORE, Calif. - It didn't take a nuclear physicist to realize changes were needed after a $40,000 ceramic mural was unveiled outside the city's new library and everyone could see the misspelled names of Einstein, Shakespeare, Vincent Van Gogh, Michelangelo and seven other historical figures.

"Our library director is very frustrated that she has this lovely new library and it has all these misspellings in front," said city councilwoman Lorraine Dietrich, one of three council members who voted Monday to authorize paying another $6,000, plus expenses, to fly the artist up from Miami to fix the errors.

Reached at her Miami studio Wednesday by The Associated Press, Maria Alquilar said she was willing to fix the brightly colored 16-foot-wide circular work, but offered no apologizes for the 11 misspellings among the 175 names.

"The importance of this work is that it is supposed to unite people," Alquilar said. "They are denigrating my work and the purpose of this work."

Alquilar said it took her quite a bit of her own time and money to create and install the work, and that it sat idle at her Santa Cruz studio for two years until the city cleared the way for its installation.

There were plenty of people around during the installation who could and should have seen the missing and misplaced letters, she said. "Even though I was on my hands and knees laying the installation out, I didn't see it," she said.

The mistakes wouldn't even register with a true artisan, Alquilar said.

"The people that are into humanities, and are into Blake's concept of enlightenment, they are not looking at the words," she said. "In their mind the words register correctly."

[Fintan]

$40,000 mural.

Refrigerator art.

 

 

[AnAmericanMother]

Well, actually, I knew the Rev. because the art dealer that was his agent in Atlanta rented space from my mother . . . just a coincidence.

But in addition to being an artist of remarkable feeling (if primitive technique), he was a good old fashioned Christian and a very nice man.

[dennisw]

I remember Rev Finster having his backyard full of his sculptures and other art. Exposed to the elements. Pretty genuine behavior for a folk artist.

[AnAmericanMother]

His back yard, his front yard, the side yards and basically the entire hill behind his house.

He lived up in Summerville, GA, in the NW corner of the state.

[dennisw]

I don't know nearly as much about art as you but I think Howard Finster helped trigger a new interest in folk art from the South. Lots of black and white folk artists got recognition. Some got ripped off by their agents but at least their art reached a greater audience. Even jaded New Yorkers were buyers.

[AnAmericanMother]

It goes in cycles. Periodically the NY cognoscenti "discover" the folk artists. They are a fixture in the South, and I think at least they used to be in New England and Pennsylvania.

Grandma Moses was the first.