A brick wall for a canvas

 

The Glens Falls artist Esmond Lyons gestures from a construction lift toward his new mural on the side of a building in the city’s east end. Joan K. Lentini photo

 

By STACEY MORRIS
Contributing writer

GLENS FALLS, N.Y.

Esmond Lyons looked up on a sunny September afternoon to assess his work in progress.
Above the Glens Falls artist was what appeared to be a massive portrait of Christ, extending the height of a three-story brick wall on the east side of the building at 153 Maple St.

The mural is patterned after Rembrandt’s “Christ with Arms Folded.” But Lyons has his own take on the famous 17th century portrait — and has added signature touches such as trompe l’oeil ladders at varying heights with artists who appear to be still at work on the outdoor painting.
He chose this particular Rembrandt work as his muse largely because the original sits only a few blocks away in quiet repose at The Hyde Collection, the art museum on Warren Street.
“I want people to come and see not only this mural but what’s been happening in the east end of Glens Falls,” he said.

The famous painting of a pensive Christ, he explained, is just the starting point for his mural.
“I think there’s a lot of confusion about what public art is,” Lyons said. “It has to be multi-layered and nuanced for me. I want it to be something that prompts people to think.”

The mural’s title, “Portrait of a Jewish Man,” references the Dutch master’s practice of seeking models for his portraits of Christ in Amsterdam’s Jewish quarter. Much of Lyons’ mural bears a deep resemblance to Rembrandt’s depiction of Jesus: bearded and clothed in a robe with shoulder-length hair parted in the middle, casting a gentle yet penetrating gaze.

Despite its iconic subject, Lyons said his mural isn’t intended a lesson in religion, art history, or anything other than viewers interpreting the imagery in their own way.

So far, he reported, reactions have ranged from expressions of reverence (“It’s the Lord!” shouted one recent visitor to his mural) to simple aesthetic appreciation from passersby who stumble upon “Portrait of a Jewish Man” and can’t help but pause to observe.

Lyons began his day’s work on the mural in the early afternoon to avoid the harsh effects of direct sunlight, which compromises the drying process of the silicate paint he’s using. The special paint, he explained, is designed to retain its vibrancy for more than 100 years — a fact that caused him to break into an anticipatory smile.

As he stood aloft on a boom lift, rendering a sketch outline of a woman on one of the trompe l’oeil ladders, a driver of a minivan came to a complete stop in the middle of Maple Street and stared for a few moments before shouting “Awesome!” in the artist’s direction.

“I’ve been getting a lot of that lately,” Lyons chuckled. “And I’m not even finished.”
The last part of his mural, he said, will be on the uppermost part of the brick wall, depicting a woman peering through binoculars with one hand and pointing in a very specific direction with the other.

Lyons’ artist statement reads, in part: “The Jewish man in Rembrandt’s painting is a human being. He has no halo, no trumpeting angels, no weightless ascension into heaven. And yet human as he is, we cannot escape the sense of the sacred that permeates the painting.
“Our intuition would suggest that there is a God within this human. Meanwhile, a woman with binoculars points toward The Hyde Collection, exhorting artists to aspire to create world-class art. And that explains what the two women painters are doing. They are reminding us that art addresses the sacred dimensions of our experience. To be connected to spirit is essential to both art and life.”

 

Reinvigorating a neighborhood
Lyons’ new piece is one of the newest and largest works in a city that lately has embraced murals and other kinds of public arts installations as a way of highlighting its blossoming cultural scene. Some of these projects have been supported by public funds, although Lyons’ new mural was not.

Lyons, 72, began painting the “Portrait of a Jewish Man” in August. Though the actual painting process has unfolded at an unfettered clip and was essentially complete by late September, his idea for the work dates back to the 1990s.

“This mural has been 27 years in the making,” he said.
Lyons has been painting professionally for 35 years, and large-scale murals are his specialty.
But when he pitched the idea for this mural to city officials and a couple of local arts organizations in Glens Falls over the years, Lyons said he found little interest. One person, he said, told him the concept was “too California.”

Undeterred, he eventually found a supporter in Eric Unkauf, a local businessman who has been spearheading the revitalization of the east end of Glens Falls, a historically lower-income neighborhood with a mix of homes, pubs and eateries, warehouses and mixed-use office space.
Unkauf made his first major mark on the neighborhood in 1999 when he acquired an abandoned shirt factory and transformed its four stories of cavernous rooms into art studio and retail space for nearly 100 tenants.

The Shirt Factory’s campus now also includes Rock Hill Bakehouse and Cafe, the specialty food purveyor Dakine Cuisine, and Freedom Machines, a nonprofit that restores donated bicycles and gives them to recovering addicts in need of transportation. In the warmer months, the complex hosts a weekly food truck festival in its courtyard.

Recently Unkauf has undertaken the creation of a mural park on a cluster of buildings and containers near The Shirt Factory.

“What I want are more murals like Esmond’s – murals that make you think,” Unkauf explained. “Otherwise it’s just wallpaper. I’m not being critical of anything else going on, but the best work comes from an artist without constraints. If an artist can express the breadth of their creativity, then the project will reflect that.

“A lot of people get stuck on local history, Adirondack scenery, and familiar locations,” he continued. “But my thought is, ‘I understand there’s a place for it, but does there have to be?’ If it doesn’t evoke an emotion, a thought, or both, it’s not good art, and I don’t want it on the sides of my buildings.”

With the oceanic “Space Whales” mural by Hannah Williams and Rob Harriman already completed, Unkauf said the next addition will be a butterfly garden painted on the south-facing side of Rock Hill Bakehouse and Cafe by artist Amber Lannutti, who explained that she’ll be interweaving Rock Hill’s philosophy into her mural. (Lannutti is also Rock Hill’s cafe manager.)
“Part of our mission as a vegan cafe is to show the symbiotic relationship we have with nature and how we need pollinators in order to eat and live,” she explained. “I’m intending the mural to be insightfully beautiful, and I’ll be painting flowers and butterfly species found in New York.”
Unkauf said he hopes his murals inspire other property owners in the neighborhood to follow suit. Ultimately, he imagines his mural park will result in 30 to 40 murals of varying sizes being completed over a decade’s time.

“Eric is the best force in Glens Falls that exists,” Lyons said. “He’s done things for this city in a few years that the bureaucrats have been talking about doing for 20 years. He’s going to transform the east end.”

Lyons said that before he began painting his mural, Unkauf sent a crew to meticulously smooth out the surface of the century-old brick wall at 153 Maple St., creating a level surface on which he could work.

“Eric did all this prep work just so I could paint — and then he let my vision unfold without input or restraint,” he said. “He’s an artist’s dream.”

Unkauf wouldn’t specify the total cost of bringing Lyons’ mural to fruition. But he did mention the expenditure of $4,000 for specialty paint made in Latvia from ground minerals to resist fading and chalking.

 

A hub for the arts
Phil Casabona, executive director of the Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council, said Unkauf’s efforts, and his collaboration with Lyons, will help bolster Glens Falls’ emerging reputation as an arts destination.

“I think it’s great that Eric and Esmond are partnering to put murals on that side of town,” he said. “We really want the public art to stretch past the main strip, and Eric has a wildly beautiful idea for more mural projects, which is wonderful for the city.”

Casabona’s organization is affiliated with the Arts District of Glens Falls, a committee of artists, arts administrators and impassioned citizens that formed nearly a decade ago to raise awareness about the city’s cultural offerings, bring more outdoor art to the city, and make Glens Falls a destination for art lovers.

Kate Austin-Avon, co-founder and administrator of the arts district, said the organization has several outdoor murals planned at varying city locations, and two have already been completed: a hot-air-balloon-themed mural at 144 Glen St. by California-based artist Jesse Melanson, and a wildlife mural by area artist Hannah Williams at 20 Warren St.

Austin-Avon said the arts district’s ultimate goal is to create a mapped-out public art trail, which will include downtown Glens Falls, Warren Street out to The Hyde Collection, and the city’s east side.

The arts district’s next mural projects are planned for 103 Warren St. and at the Charles R. Wood Theater’s building at 207 Glen St.

Austin-Avon said that although the murals are a natural focal point, the group’s public art projects also include mini-murals on utility boxes, branded bike racks, and colorful Adirondack chairs positioned on downtown sidewalks.

“Raising the visibility of the arts in Glens Falls makes it more apparent that the city is an amazing arts destination,” she said. “We have 13 arts organizations, three museums, two theaters, numerous galleries, and a symphony orchestra within four square miles.”

Katelyn Foley, the education curator at The Hyde Collection, said murals such as “Portrait of a Jewish Man” and others throughout the city are indeed heightening both awareness and appreciation of the arts.

“Rembrandt’s portrait of Christ was one of the Hydes’ greatest accomplishments in their career of collecting,” she said in an e-mail statement. “The Hyde Collection is thrilled that the community is embracing public art, and the remarkable work of the muralists brings attention to Glens Falls’ longstanding commitment to the arts.”

Last month, as the sun was setting on another day of painting for Lyons, he was again interrupted by an admirer who’d come to the foot of the mural for a closer look.
“Wait,” said the man after several moments of staring. “You mean, that ladder’s not real?”
“That’s why I love trompe l’oeil,” Lyons said with a smile. “It fools you for a second and reminds us we live in a world of illusions.”

 

Visit shirtfactorygf.com/public-art/ for more information on pubic art at The Shirt Factory complex. Visit www.artsdistrictgf.com for more information about the Arts District of Glens Falls.