…so said Edward Hopper, one of my favourite painters of the last century. I think that you can get the true meaning of what he said by having a look at the rather wonderful giant mural that is emerging in Salisbury City Centre over these last couple of weeks of November. A rural landscape is evolving before the eyes of the shoppers, taxi drivers and market traders in a place which was simply sterile before; an unpromising and immense stretch of chip board hoarding is being transformed into a thing of beauty.
Every day it is different. Last week Sam was joined by a disparate collection of staff and parent artists, wielding rollers and brushes with a varying level of flair, bravery and effectiveness. Many of our wonderful Sixth Form Art students visited as the days passed, lending their talent to great effect. In the coming week it will be the turn of the younger boys and I can’t wait to see the impact that serried ranks of 12 and 13 year olds will have (presumably on the lower echelons of the work!).
It is all Sam’s fault of course. A couple of weeks ago she suggested the possibility to me, and after the green light was given by Salisbury City Council and the CEO of Bradbeers she then pestered companies for materials – very successfully it would appear! The speed with which she than began to execute the work was simply breath-taking. When I went along on Tuesday to do some trees on the western end of the picture I thought that I would be painting onto a virgin ‘canvas’. Far from it; there was plenty of landscape foundation there already, and a sky and cloudscape too. And since then a fantastic piece of detailing right in the centre of the picture has emerged, a typical drove path through a gate, heading between rolling chalk hillsides towards the distant spire.
What message does it send? What would those words be? There’s something about celebration in here, bringing the extraordinary bucolic landscape of Wiltshire into the City Centre for everyone to see. What we take for granted when we commute home in bus or car is truly beautiful, and the painting shows our county for what it is. Sam’s plan is for the mural to evolve through the winter and spring so that wintry fields and woods are replaced, in due course, by the promise of new growth as spring dawns. Then there’s the idea of rebirth – not just of the natural world as the sun warms, but also the new life spreading back into Salisbury as the effects of the pandemic wane. And of course the mural is a celebration of creativity in its purest form, of the expression of ideas and of the way in which we can change things for the better if we all work together.
The mural is growing and changing all the time. If you get the opportunity to do so go and have a look. There’s also plenty of coverage in the local media and on the ‘socials’. We’re very proud of what Sam is doing right at the very heart of our city, and I think that Edward Hopper would have thoroughly approved too…
SDS
