MADISON, Wis. — A colorful mural on the side of a building on Madison’s near east side is getting some updates.
Baltimore-based artist Michael Owen has returned to Madison to restore his original mural, which features four hands spelling out the word “LOVE” on the side of the building at 924 Williamson Street.
After painting 20 of the murals across Baltimore, Owen began to paint them in other cities. Madison was one of the first on the list.
In 2014, he painted the mural on the side of what was then the Plan B nightclub. Today, the building is home to I/O Arcade Bar.
When the wall the mural is painted on needed some repairs, Owen got a call asking him to come back to the city and fix the mural.
That, he said, is uncommon.
“You just don’t know what’s going to happen to a piece as an artist once you sign it and leave, especially when you’re not in a city, when you don’t live or reside there,” he said. “To be able to get this callback and to have the new management call me and say, ‘Hey, we want this back, we’re willing to pay you to come back and restore this out of our own pockets,’ that’s speaking on multiple levels.”
Owen began working on the project on Sunday and is set to be done on Tuesday.
Once he’s done, the mural won’t be an exact recreation of his 2014 work, but the heart of the display will remain.
“I could’ve just done a carbon copy of what was there, but it’s been eight years and this is a rare opportunity to get a call back for restoration,” he said, “and I wanted to add some more life to it, some more color.”
Working on the restoration has also given him a chance to hear from area residents about what the mural means to them.
One woman, Owen said, told him her kids want to take their senior photos in front of it.
“It’s definitely an icon for different generations that are out here and that’s kind of what I’m trying to do is connect people with an idea, with a theme, with a concept of love. There’s so much division out there, even now,” he said.
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