{"id":20359,"date":"2021-09-09T01:28:56","date_gmt":"2021-09-09T05:28:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=20359"},"modified":"2021-09-09T01:52:08","modified_gmt":"2021-09-09T05:52:08","slug":"ekua-holmes-london-parker-mcwhorter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2021\/09\/09\/ekua-holmes-london-parker-mcwhorter\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Seeding The Future\u2019 With Ekua Holmes And London Parker-McWhorter\u2019s New Grove Hall Mural"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe not only garden with seeds and plants and flowers, but we garden in our communities with souls and minds and hearts,\u201d Boston artist Ekua Holmes<\/a> said of the temporary, printed murals that she created with London Parker-McWhorter as part of \u201cMentoring Murals,\u201d a pilot project from Boston independent public art curators Now + There in partnership with Greater Grove Hall Main Streets and support from Breeze\u2019s Laundromat.<\/p>\n

The design features bright sunflowers\u2014inspired by Holmes\u2019s \u201cRoxbury Sunflower Project,\u201d on which she previously collaborated with Parker-McWhorter\u2014as well as the hands of Holmes’s son, children who have participated in the \u201cRoxbury Sunflower Project,\u201d a Black elder, a South Carolina farmer.<\/p>\n

An outdoor reception yesterday celebrated the debut of the artworks, titled “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d<\/a> which are mounted on a 13 by 60-foot wall on the side of Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave. and two nearby shipping containers in Boston\u2019s Grove Hall neighborhood. They\u2019re expected to be on view from Sept. 8 to Dec. 7, 2021.<\/p>\n

\"Ekua<\/a>
Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Holmes won the Caldecott Honor in 2016 for illustrating the children\u2019s book \u201cVoice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer, Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement.\u201d She is vice-chair of the Boston Art Commission and associate director of Massachusetts College of Art and Design\u2019s Center for Art and Community Partnerships, managing and coordinating its Sparc! ArtMobile.<\/p>\n

Holmes\u2019s \u201cRoxbury Sunflower Project\u201d<\/a> debuted in the summer of 2018, developing out of her participation in Now + There\u2019s Public Art Accelerator Program,<\/a> which teaches artists the logistical ins and outs of creating public art here. For her first public art project, Holmes gave out thousands of seeds to fill Roxbury with sunflowers as symbols of Black beauty, resilience, deep roots, and ability to transform problems into something good. She\u2019s continued it annually since\u2014including a major planting on the Huntington Avenue lawn of Boston\u2019s Museum of Fine Arts this summer, which is also hosting an exhibition of her art, “Paper Stories, Layered Dreams,\u201d<\/a> from July 17, 2021, to Jan. 23, 2022.<\/p>\n

Parker-McWhorter is a photographer, artist, researcher as well as co-caretaker of United Neighbors of Lower Roxbury Garden.<\/p>\n

Holmes and Parker-McWhorter\u2019s Grove Hall mural, Gilbert said, aims \u201cto create the radiant, uplifting pictures of Black youth that they want to see and we can all benefit from experiencing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of our work is focused on youth, our seeds, who we are nurturing and taking care of, and who will take our place,\u201d Holmes said. She hoped the artworks would prompt feelings of \u201cjoy and possibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can transform a space that might have been neglected,\u201d Parker-McWhorter said. He noted that the neighborhood had suffered from capital flight since a 1967 uprising. \u201cThere\u2019s possibility in some of these empty spaces.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is the second artwork in the \u201cMentoring Murals\u201d series, after Paul Goodnight and Larry Pierce\u2019s design, which was on view here this summer<\/a>. \u201cTo amplify the Black mural movement\u2019s past and present in Roxbury and Dorchester,\u201d Now + There writes, \u201cthe project builds on the importance of mentorship in maintaining a vibrant Black arts community by inviting artists to team up with a younger artist to create side-by-side works of art on a visible wall in the neighborhood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Previously:<\/strong>
\nAug. 12, 2021: Paul Goodnight And Larry Pierce Collaborate On Grove Hall Mural<\/a>
\nJune 12, 2018: What Happens If You Plant 10,000 Sunflowers At The Heart Of Boston\u2019s Black Community?<\/a>
\nSept. 19, 2018: Checking In On Ekua Holmes’s Blossoming ‘Roxbury Sunflowers Project’<\/a>
\nMay 15, 2021: Artists To Turn MFA Lawn Into A Garden<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, nature, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, (hopefully) weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2021 or the respective creators.)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\"London<\/a>
London Parker-McWhorter (left) and Ekua Holmes with their temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Ekua<\/a>
Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Ekua<\/a>
Ekua Holmes (left) and London Parker-McWhorter talk about their temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Ekua<\/a>
Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Now<\/a>
Now + There Community Partnership Manager Kenney Mascary (left) and Executive Director Kate Gilbert celebrate Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"London<\/a>
London Parker-McWhorter (left) and Ekua Holmes talk about their temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Ekua<\/a>
Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Greater<\/a>
Greater Grove Hall Main Streets Executive Director Ed Gaskin celebrates Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Now<\/a>
Now + There Curator Leah Triplett Harrington celebrates Ekua Holmes and London Parker-McWhorter’s temporary, printed murals “Honoring the past, seeding the future,\u201d at Breeze\u2019s Laundromat at 345 Blue Hill Ave., Boston, Sept. 8, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe not only garden with seeds and plants and flowers, but we garden in our communities with souls and minds and hearts,\u201d Boston artist Ekua Holmes said of the temporary, printed murals that she created with London Parker-McWhorter as part of \u201cMentoring Murals,\u201d a pilot project from Boston independent public art curators Now + There […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20364,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100,113,105],"tags":[37,440,867,390],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20359"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20359"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20382,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20359\/revisions\/20382"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}