As artist Anna Murphy worked on a Chicago Lawn viaduct mural, there were days the paint would freeze.
“I couldn’t paint if it was below 32 degrees,” she says of the mural she finished in December. “But I spent many days out painting when it was 34.”
As a result, people passing through the viaduct on West 63rd Street at South Central Park Avenue are greeted with a fantastical and detailed blue-and-white world on a gold background. The images — children, forests, critters and flowers — are in stark contrast to the cold and often gray days of a long Chicago winter.
Murphy says she hopes the mural “inspires people to dream and open their hearts and believe beautiful things are possible.”
The mural is a collection of paintings on four walls of the underpass: the outside walls and the walls of arches separating the sidewalks from the traffic lanes. The illustrated concrete is on the walls facing the sidewalks.
Murphy tapped her background as an oil painter to create the intricate images of kids hanging on hollyhocks and reaching out to hummingbirds. Squirrels and deer mingle among mushrooms. Ducks, bunnies, foxes, raccoons, dahlias and trumpet flowers juxtapose warmth next to a backdrop of barren deciduous trees.
On one side of West 63rd Street is written “Spread your wings and fly.” Across traffic looking back, the wall reads “abre tus alas y vuela,” which is a similar phrase in Spanish.
The arch walls facing the sidewalk are a brilliant gold, with blue and white honey bees buzzing alongside and above the domed spaces. Murphy says she painted each wall so pedestrians can look through each archway opening from the sidewalks and see a scene framed on the other side of 63rd street.
The mural is “especially geared toward children and youth and wanting to be a place where, when they pass through, they feel uplifted and inspired,” Murphy says. “As I was working on the mural, kids would walk by, and I would see how excited they would be to point out the animals and show their parents.”
Murphy says she also hopes the mural inspires adults to tap into their inner child.
Blue, white and gold are Murphy’s signature palate. She lives in Pilsen but grew up in England, and the blue and white imagery reminds her of the china teacups she used as a child. The gold, she says, “brings the magic and divinity to it.”
Nature is a recurring theme in Murphy’s work, she says. Bees also are a staple, symbolizing the foundation of life and humans’ dependence on pollinators. She often features cherubs, and drawings of children were an appropriate addition for this piece — even more so because she learned she was pregnant while painting the mural.
“It will always have a special place in my heart,” she says.
The finished mural’s two outside walls are 93 feet by 13 feet and 76 feet by 13 feet. The inner arch walls are each 47 feet by 13 feet. The mural was commissioned by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. Murphy says the mural will be recognized with an event in the spring, once the weather warms up.
