The Seattle Covid-19 Murals: Creativity and Cheer

Dozens of COVID 19 murals going up on Capitol Hill from Pike and 10th to Broadway and Pine, in Pioneer Square, and a third group in Ballard. The idea is that plywood over closed stores provides a great surface for painting. Many types of artists are involved, and the procedures vary. Sometimes an individual store owner directly chooses artists, as with the Globe Bookstore, Molly Moon, and Oddfellows; other times it is an organization like the Alliance for Pioneer Square and Pioneer Square Business Improvement Association. Here is a link to a website that lists all the artists and murals there in Pioneer Square. See pioneersquare.org/experiences/murals-in-pioneer-square. Another organization is “Signs of Hope” by CreativityThatConnects. creativitythatconnects.com/collections/seattle-locations-1.

In some cases, artists simply paint beautiful imagery such as lush green foliage (Josephine Riceflower Wakuda) or mountain peaks (Nikki Frumkin). Often there are encouraging words: “Keep Going,” “Slow Down” “Stay Strong,” “Stay Home,” “I can’t wait to see you again,” etc. The theme of the mural is frequently directly related to the store that commissioned it, as in the cheery works of Morgan Zion on Molly Moon’s Ice cream stores and Coastal Kitchen (a nautical theme of course).