By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Some new characters, or rather critters, are headed to downtown Bowling Green.
The plan is sometime this summer, artist Carrie Day along with Gordon Ricketts, will move her signature critters from pottery and paintings to a mural on the north-facing outside wall of Howard’s Club H.
The project is now in the fundraising stages. A benefit show will be held Sunday, May 15, at the club, and Day is seeking sponsors to help supplement money from Andy Halleck who owns the Howard’s building (Steve Feehan owns the Howard’s business) and a $5,000 mini-grant from the city.
Day said the response has been good. Sponsors may join at the silver level of $250. They will get acknowledgements on social media and the project t-shirt. For the gold level of $500, donors will also have their names inscribed on a plaque next to the mural.
Day is hoping to get the names together before Wednesday, so she can get the t-shirts printed. Anyone interested should contact her by email at critcarrieday@gmail.com.
“It’s on Howard’s. It has a connection with Howard’s,” she said. “But it’s for the city. It’s for everybody in the city. It’s to beautify the city to help bring people downtown. I have a distinct style. People, if they know my work and not from here, they’ll recognize it right away.”
Day’s “critters” stem from her childhood nickname.
[RELATED: Carrie Day gives voice to her inner Critter with clay and paint]
The childlike approach is appropriate given the mural is across from the Wood County District Public Library. “My work is like so childlike and fun, it’ll brighten up things.”
The parking lot the wall faces has been the spot for several disturbances in the past year, including a shooting.
The idea for the mural came from Gordon Ricketts, who has created murals around Bowling Green and Toledo, often with students taking a BGSU summer class. Ricketts retired at the end of last year.
[RELATED: Gordon Ricketts retiring from School of Art after two decades of changing lives & painting the town]
Last fall, he was talking to Day at a high school soccer game. He suggested Day design a mural, and offered to assist with the project.
Day’s response was: “Oh, cool. I’ve never done a mural, but if you’re going to help me that would be so much fun.”
Ricketts had been Day’s drawing teacher when she was first a student at BGSU between 1998-2001. They’ve been friends since.
They needed a wall to paint. It was Day’s husband, Tim Concannon, who suggested Howard’s.
When she talked to Halleck, he wondered if she would create one akin to her abstract paintings. But she thought her critters would be better. A tribute to the characters who frequent the club.
Both Ricketts, who envisions doing a murals around town, and Day applied for the city mini-grants. She got the grant for the Howard’s wall mural.
She’s started the design. It’s in her head with some ideas on paper. But she knows once she starts painting the wall she’ll improvise. “It won’t look exactly like it’ll look on paper.”
Day expects to do most of the painting, though she’ll use volunteers to fill in around the figures.
First the wall, which is 100 feet long, needs work. There are pock marks to fill, and then the surface needs to be scrapped and primed. “The wall is in pretty bad condition. … It’s a mess.”
Ricketts said he’s available to do the work either first week of June or first week in July. He estimates the project will take about a week, though Day expects it may take longer.
Day will fit it in to a busy schedule. She just closed a show in Detroit featuring 27 of her paintings. Her ceramics will be on display at a gallery in Iowa City. And this month she’ll have one piece in a group show at River House Arts in Toledo.
The benefit show will feature a half dozen bands including Nikki D and the Sisters of Thunder. Also on the bill, will be Amp Wagon, Corduroy Road, Timmy C and the Game Changers, Scottish Mile, and Freight Street.
Admission will be $20. For $200, the donor will receive a work on paper by Day.
