I-83’s new murals redefine graffiti cleanup

For many, driving the Jones Falls Expressway into the city marks their introduction to Baltimore. Mayor Brandon Scott wants to make a brighter, more vibrant first impression.

If you’ve been on I-83 this week, you’ve likely noticed five new colorful murals painted by local artists between North Avenue and Maryland Avenue. They’re part of an initiative from the Mayor’s Office of Arts, Culture and Entertainment (MOACE) to address graffiti and beautify stretches of the well-worn freeway with public art — which explains last weekend’s JFX lane closures.

On Saturday, a double-lane closure will occur again from 5 a.m. to 4 p.m. between the 29th Street ramp and Guilford Avenue, and the Maryland Avenue exit ramp from the southbound JFX will also close. During that time, MOACE and volunteers will continue to clean up graffiti and paint jersey barriers.

MOACE Director Linzy Jackson said the murals initiative was Scott’s idea to approach graffiti clean-up in a new way that treats “arts and culture as infrastructure.”

“We wanted to commission local artists to help make that happen,” Jackson said.

Baltimore-based artists answered the call to submit mural concepts for the project, which was produced by Gaia, the acclaimed street artist with large-scale murals found in Charm City and around the world.

Gaia helped with logistics, from machine operation to labor subcontracting. He also contributed a mural, located underneath the Maryland Avenue underpass by the Oliver Street exit, that features alternative modes of transit to cars, like bicycles, scooters and wheelchairs.

The other selected artists were Ernest Shaw, D Star (a.k.a. Darien Currin), Sha’Ran Lowe and Jennifer Weightman — a cohort that worked 16-hour days last weekend to complete their works before the lanes had to reopen.

The first painting in the row of four is by Shaw, the veteran artist and West Baltimore native with more than two decades of local teaching experience. The blue-hued, meditative work depicts a side profile of his former student Dante Crawford, an 18-year-old who died in an August 2021 triple shooting in Park Heights.

“I did not necessarily paint his portrait as a memorial,” Shaw said, “because to me, he’s not gone.”

Lowe’s cosmic painting shows a Black male student from Baltimore sitting atop a rowhome in the clouds as he holds a shining star on a fishing line. It’s located between D Star’s “Wild Style”-esque ode to “The Jones Falls Valley” and Weightman’s Raven and Oriole in flight.

It’s the first solo mural by Lowe, a Baltimore County middle school English teacher who paints under the alias Tall Thunda. With teaching experience in Baltimore City schools, she wanted to dedicate a painting to her students who persevere and still dream big, despite trying circumstances.

“It’s showing this young man who is determined, still trying, still going,” Lowe said. “And at the right moment at the right time, he’s eventually going to reach that moment where it’s the ‘A-ha!’ It’s the, ‘I got this.’”

The murals, which were covered in anti-graffiti coating, are part of Scott’s “90-Day Sprint Challenge,” which he announced during his State of the City address in late March. He tasked the city’s Department of Public Works to remove 6,000 pieces of graffiti throughout the city within 90 days, starting on April 16.

Jackson said more public art projects will appear along I-83 in the weeks to come. Shaw said he hopes the city will continue to support these beautification efforts through local artists.

“We have to have the funding, whether it comes from local, state, federal government or from the private sector,” Shaw said. “But we have the talent here in the city.”