SUBMITTED PHOTO
Artist Jesse Gouchey will be in the Hat this weekend to paint a mural downtown. His mural will be dedicated to missing and murdered Indigenous women in Canada.
mcranker@medicinehatnews.com@MHNmocranker
A number of artists will be downtown this weekend painting murals to give downtown more street art.
Pop Up Parks is bringing artist Jesse Gouchey to the city to paint a mural in honour and memory of missing and murdered Indigenous women.
“Jesse is going to create a mural to commemorate and bring attention to missing and murdered Indigenous women in Canada,” said Pop Up Parks board member Dina Jubrak. “Jesse made the design himself and the youth group here is going to be involved with the event.”
The murals will be painted at the pedestrian portion of the underpass on First Street SE under the bridge. On top of Gouchey’s work, artists from a local tattoo shop will be working on a separate piece.
“The Lucky Squid does community work and we reached out to them to see if they would want to do something with us,” said Jubrak. “Those artists will have visual communication students helping them create a second mural across the street that will be similar in nature but not at all identical.”
The area was painted years ago by Street Art Works, and Jubrak says it is now a good time to give the area a face lift.
“Those are starting to look a bit old and weathered,” she said. “We contacted municipal works and they’re on board with this.
“Obviously the aesthetic part of this is important, but studies also show an economic benefit to places where street art is prominent – there’s plenty of reasons why street art is a great thing.”
The News will publish photos of the murals in Monday’s paper.
