New street mural project on The Block celebrates Asheville’s black history

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Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

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Chicken Alley image via Asheville Graffiti Project and H1 Design Group

Mural genius Molly Must, the artist behind the gorgeous electric blue Chicken Alley mural and the 240 overpass art downtown, is at it again.

This time Must is running a Kickstarter effort to raise $7800 to beautify Triangle Park (the triangle-shaped wedge of green space on the Block), remind Asheville of a lost piece of its history, and help revitalize that end of Market St.

Her Kickstarter campaign is more than just a creative effort to revitalize a public space with high-quality art: It’s also the story of The Block and the nearby East End, Asheville’s first black neighborhood and home to the former slaves of the Patton family.

From an AC-T article:

The neighborhood in the late 1800s and early 1900s was a bustling hub of African-American life in Asheville. But it declined after a major project in the 1960s to rework streets and move homeowners and businesses. At the time, it was labeled an “urban renewal” project, a thin excuse for the upheaval it caused.

The Block has never been the same since. Despite the recent downtown economic rise the past decade or so, the crossroads of Eagle and Market streets have remained largely undeveloped. There are plans — there have always been plans — to revitalize the area, though nothing has taken hold.

Must believes the power of public art can help fix that.

With the support of Just Folks, an organization dedicated to preserving local African-American culture and activity downtown, and the Asheville Design Center (ADC), a local non-profit dedicated to community-driven design, Must wants to create public art that shows the history of The Block chronologically, using screen-printed reproductions of real Ashevilleans from archival photos.

Using her own paint and community labor at a Just Folks event, Must’s effort is already partially underway. In about three days, she’s raised nearly $3000 of the project’s $7800 goal.

Learn more here.

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Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

  • 1

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6 Comments

  1. JJS June 21, 2012

    Jennifer,

    For the record…I travel Internationally for a living and own a home in Asheville. Your blog really keeps me informed when I am away from home. I rely on your emails to keep me posted while I travel outside the US. Keep up the good work!

    JJ

    Reply
    1. Jennifer Saylor June 21, 2012

      JJ, thanks SO much. I’m so glad the blog is getting you the info you need about Asheville. FYI, I’m just a new contributor: Journalist Jason Sandford ran Ashvegas solo for 7 years or so until I started posting–just this month! I know it looks like about 20 people run Ashvegas, but for 99% of its run, it was just Jason. He makes the magic happen.

      Thanks again.

      Reply
  2. Jennifer Saylor June 18, 2012

    Hey Nate, thanks for taking an interest in how we do things. We actually DO schedule posts — mine today were spaced 2 hours apart from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. But since time-sensitive posts need to go out on the day they matter, some days we slam our audience. On slow days, not so much. We’re actually trying to space things out more, and it looks like we need to do better and try harder. Your comment is noted. Thanks!

    Reply
  3. Nate June 18, 2012

    Reading this blog is like drinking from a firehose that’s only turned on sporadically … days with no posts, days with one post, and then days like yesterday with EIGHTEEN posts. Wouldn’t it make your lives earlier to schedule things to come out on a more regular, steady basis? Any blogging software will let you pre-schedule posts and trickle them out on a more consistent basis . . .

    Reply

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